Read the passage and answer the question.

In 1917, Petrograd feels like a city holding its breath. Bread lines stretch around corners, and rumors travel faster than the trams. In the Putilov Factory, workers gather near the gates, their hands raw from metal and winter. When a foreman announces another pay cut “for the good of the war effort,” the crowd does not merely grumble; it swells. A young lathe operator named Anya watches older men—usually cautious—step forward and speak with a steadiness that surprises her.

By noon, the factory yard becomes a meeting place. Someone reads a leaflet aloud, and each sentence seems to strike sparks. The words are not polished, but they are urgent: the writer lists how wages shrink while prices climb, how sons vanish at the front, how officials promise relief and deliver only speeches. The leaflet’s tone is incendiary, and Anya can tell because people who arrived tired and silent now shout, raise fists, and push toward the street as if the paper itself has set them alight.

Outside, the march gains strangers: seamstresses, students, soldiers on leave. A sailor climbs a lamppost and calls for order, but his own voice trembles with anger. Some chant for bread; others chant for an end to the war. The slogans are not identical, yet they move in the same direction, like tributaries feeding one river. Anya notices how quickly the mood shifts. An hour ago, neighbors spoke in whispers, wary of informers. Now they speak openly, as if fear has been peeled away.

At the edge of the crowd, a shopkeeper locks his door and mutters that the city is turning into a furnace. He is not wrong. The protest is not just a complaint; it is a heat that spreads. Even those who do not join feel it in the air, in the hurried footsteps, in the way soldiers hesitate before deciding whether to block the street or step aside.

That evening, Anya returns home with soot on her coat and a strange clarity in her mind. She realizes the day’s power did not come from a single leader or a perfect plan. It came from words that made people feel that waiting quietly was no longer possible.

What does the word incendiary mean as used in the passage?​

Read the passage and answer the question.

On the first day of rehearsal, Mr. Alvarez does not hand out scripts. Instead, he asks the cast to sit in a circle on the stage floor and listen. “Before you can speak as someone else,” he says, “you have to notice how you speak as yourself.”

Lena, who has played small roles before, expects warm-ups and jokes. What she gets is observation. Mr. Alvarez asks them to read a single line—“I didn’t mean it”—in ten different ways: defensive, relieved, amused, furious, ashamed. Each time, he stops them and asks what changed: the speed, the emphasis, the breath. He is not satisfied with vague answers like “I made it sad.” He wants evidence.

When Jonah tries to rush through his turn, Mr. Alvarez raises a hand. “Don’t sprint past the hard part,” he says. “Stay with it.” Jonah tries again, slower this time, and the line lands with surprising weight.

As the rehearsal continues, Lena realizes the director’s method is exacting. He notices the smallest habits—an actor’s tendency to look down when uncertain, a laugh that appears whenever someone is nervous. He does not scold, but he also does not let mistakes slide. If a gesture feels false, he asks them to repeat it until it becomes honest or disappears.

By the end of the session, Lena is exhausted in a way she did not expect. Yet she is also proud. The work feels like polishing something until it reflects light. She understands that the director is not being difficult for fun; he is demanding precision because he believes the story deserves it.

What does the word exacting mean as used in the passage?​