- The chapter starts with Asher Lev narrating in the first person, telling us that yes, he is the controversial creator of the painting Brooklyn Crucifixion, and no, he's not gonna apologize for it. Well, okay then.
- Then Asher gives us a glimpse into his early childhood in Crown Heights, Brooklyn. We meet his mother, Rivkeh, whom Asher draws falling backwards in a rowboat. And we meet his father, Aryeh, who is always busy traveling for the Rabbi and telling Asher to drink his orange juice before the vitamins go out of it.
- We also learn about Asher's mythic ancestor, which is another name for Asher's great-great-grandfather on his dad's side. This mythic ancestor is of course dead but basically a character in the novel given how much Asher dreams about him.
- The mythic ancestor used to work for a goyische (non-Jewish) Russian nobleman who would get crazy-drunk and burn down villages for fun. The mythic ancestor turned the nobleman's estates into an impressive source of income for himself and his employer, and in his later years began traveling the world and teaching wisdom from the Torah.
- Somewhere in the middle of the chapter, Rivkeh's brother—Asher's Uncle Yaakov—dies in a car accident in Detroit while traveling for the Rabbi.
- Rivkeh becomes sick with grief as a result of this, and Aryeh stops traveling for the Rabbi. Asher is constantly trying to cheer his mother up, sometimes by making the "pretty" drawings she's always telling him to make.
- When that doesn't work, his drawings get real and start to reflect how unpretty the world is. He draws one of his mom sick in bed, which completely sends his dad over the edge.
- Aryeh stops traveling all over the continental United States for the Rabbi and hires a nanny, Mrs. Rackover, to take over Rivkeh's duties around the house.
- One fateful Passover, Aryheh's brother—Asher's Uncle Yitzchok—comes to visit the Lev family. He sees six-year-old Asher's drawings and is completely blown away.
- He even goes so far as to ask to buy one, which is kind of a crazy thing to ask from a six-year-old. He then compares Asher to Picasso and Chagall, two pretty intense people to compare a six-year-old to.
- A few weeks later, Asher meets the funny-name-having Yudel Krinsky, one of the Jews who was persecuted by Stalin in Russia and then got lucky enough to escape.
- Yudel was put in Siberia for eleven years, and had to leave his family behind in Russia when he came to America. Yudel Krinsky's story really sticks with Asher.
- Asher's mother gets better and decides she's going to finish the work that her brother Yaakov abandoned, which was to study Russian Jewish culture and advise the Rabbi on it.
- Asher's father goes back to traveling for the Rabbi. And Asher decides his drawings make people he loves too angry to be worth doing, so he stops doing them.