“Monsters exist, but they are too few in number to be truly dangerous. More dangerous are the common men, the functionaries ready to believe and to act without asking questions.” ― Primo Levi
The Nazis were these common men, the functionaries as described by Primo Levi, blindly following and believing without thinking for themselves. This blind obedience was a large factor in making the holocaust possible. Both Louis Lowry and Mark Herman explore the theme of Jewish persecution in their stories. However, Number The Stars and Boy in Striped Pyjamas take different approaches towards this theme.
Due to different character perspectives, Number the Stars and Boy in Striped Pyjamas present very different attitudes towards Jews. The Johansen family are sympathetic towards Jews while most of the Bruno’s family are not.
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Despite many clues suggesting otherwise, Bruno continues to believe that Auschwitz is a nice place and there is no injustice going on; this is used to display how unfathomable such a violation of human rights is to an innocent child. Bruno’s naivety is shown near the beginning of the movie, where he sees the Jewish prisoners working, he thinks they are farmers and mistakes their uniform for pyjamas. As the story develops he gains a better understanding of the truth because of his friendship with Shmuel, but after seeing the Nazi propaganda video he begins to believe it is a nice and fun camp that all the Jews are willingly staying at. He continues to believe this until the end of the story despite clearly seeing the opposite right in front of him because such cruelty is so hard for him, an innocent child, to comprehend. Annemarie on the other hand is more aware of what is going on because she is older than Bruno and not quite as naïve and the adults disclose more information to her because of this, however she is still not fully aware of everything that is going
The overall storyline of The Boy in the Striped Pajamas was the same, but in the movie there was a lot of detail lef tout. The movie is more basic and doesnt have as much detail about the characters feelings/emotions. Overall, Bruno learned that curiousity kills, and his family learned to be responsible and not take things
The Germans can only be described as monsters, for their horrific acts of cruelty are wholly inhumane. During the Holocaust, the Germans strip the Jews of everything in their possession, to the point where the Jews are completely dehumanized. This is all a part of the Germans’ scheme to massacre the Jews with...
In The Boy in the Striped Pajamas by John Boyne, a young naive boy, Bruno, tells from his perspective how the occurrences in the Holocaust took place. In 1943, the beginning of the story, Bruno’s father, a commandant in Hitler’s army, is promoted and moves to Oswiecim with his family. Oswiecim is home to the hideous Auschwitz Concentration Camp. While Bruno is out playing near a fence at the edge of Auschwitz Concentration Camp, against his father’s orders, he becomes friends with a young Jewis...
One of the many themes that has arose is the theme of injustice. The theme of injustice stood out just by reading the back of the book. As stated before, this book takes place in the time of Hitler’s reign in Nazi Germany. If anyone had previous knowledge as to what Adolf Hitler’s “final solution” entitled, social injustice would evidently be pointed out. These prejudices could be something such as concentration camps, torture, discrimination of the Jewish race and the destruction of homes and shops. Although many Germans had no idea what was happening in Germany during Hitler’s reign, one would be quick to judge Germans as a whole. This is the perspective that is dominant in the novel, they never mention massacre or concentration camps, and they just lived their normal lives. After the author educates the reader about a Jewish man named Max Vandenburg, the narrator says: “You could argue that Liesel Meminger had it easy. She did have it easy compared to Max Vandenburg. Certainly, her brother practically died in her arms. Her mother abandoned her. But anything was better than being a Jew” (Zusak 161). This quote by itself shows how terribly the Jewish people were treated. In their daily lives, they are faced with destruction, social injustice, and discrimination. They are treated very disrespectfully; they live with racial slurs, house raids, as well as having the Star of David painted on
The events which have become to be known as The Holocaust have caused much debate and dispute among historians. Central to this varied dispute is the intentions and motives of the perpetrators, with a wide range of theories as to why such horrific events took place. The publication of Jonah Goldhagen’s controversial but bestselling book “Hitler’s Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust” in many ways saw the reigniting of the debate and a flurry of scholarly and public interest. Central to Goldhagen’s disputed argument is the presentation of the perpetrators of the Holocaust as ordinary Germans who largely, willingly took part in the atrocities because of deeply held and violently strong anti-Semitic beliefs. This in many ways challenged earlier works like Christopher Browning’s “Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland” which arguably gives a more complex explanation for the motives of the perpetrators placing the emphasis on circumstance and pressure to conform. These differing opinions on why the perpetrators did what they did during the Holocaust have led to them being presented in very different ways by each historian. To contrast this I have chosen to focus on the portrayal of one event both books focus on in detail; the mass shooting of around 1,500 Jews that took place in Jozefow, Poland on July 13th 1942 (Browning:2001:225). This example clearly highlights the way each historian presents the perpetrators in different ways through; the use of language, imagery, stylistic devices and quotations, as a way of backing up their own argument. To do this I will focus on how various aspects of the massacre are portrayed and the way in which this affects the presentation of the per...
When Bruno moved to Auschwitz he was completely oblivious to the Holocaust. When he met Shmuel, he became slightly more aware, but couldn’t comprehend what it all meant. It is ironic that his innocence sheltered him from the traumatizing truth of the Holocaust, but it is what killed him in the
History of the Holocaust, written by Yehuda Bauer in the early 1980s, is a comprehensive history of the Holocaust and the surrounding details about Nazism, Anti-Semitism, and the Jewish lifestyle before the Holocaust. Mr. Bauer starts of the book with a general overview of “Who are the Jews?” and how their history led to the Jewish Holocaust. The emergence of the Jews is a controversial, confusing, and conflicting set of theories. Bauer then goes on to discuss how the rise of anti-Semitism was devastating for the Jews.
For many years, people time and time again denied the happenings of the Holocaust or partially understood what was happening. Even in today’s world, when one hears the word ‘Holocaust’, they immediately picture the Nazi’s persecution upon millions of innocent Jews, but this is not entirely correct. This is because Jews
“Jews, listen to me! I see fire! There are huge flames! It is a furnace,” Madame Schachter imagined fire, the fire that would burn millions of Jews, gays, and disabled people. Many people died in crematory ovens during the Holocaust. The people who are responsible for the Holocaust are the minor Nazi soldiers because they didn’t question decisions, they ultimately pulled the trigger, and they separated families.
The Holocaust was the murder and persecution of approximately 6 million Jews and many others by the Nazi regime and its collaborators. The Nazis came to power in Germany in January of 1933. The Nazis thought that the “inferior” Jews were a threat to the “racially superior” German racial community. The death camps were operated from 1941 to 1945, and many people lost their lives or were forced to work in concentration camps during these years. The story leading up to the Holocaust, how the terrible event affected people’s lives, and how it came to and end are all topics that make this historic event worth learning about.
This is Especially because I love dangerous and intenseful books which made this book a perfect match. I had originally not fully understood the Holocaust, and what people had to deal with. It is because of this book I have truly learned all of the facts. Number The Stars is a book that I enjoyed reading and recommend to anyone who would like to learn more about the Holocaust. The book starts off with Annemarie and Ellen Rosen running home from school. Two german soldiers stop tham and start interrogating the girls like they did something wrong just by running. They did it was a rule that all Jewish people must not run or ride their bicycles. The Nazi soldiers are putting strict rules on all jews until one day. One day can change everything even family. Peter, Annemarie's brother got taken away for buying bread and is now at a concentration camp. When I read this sentence I freaked out. “Uncle rushed in and told us that Pater was taken on the train to the camps, my heart fell (Lowry 140).This is just one one piece of evidence that made my heart drop. The book grabs the reader so much and puts the reader in the characters shoes that I was upset that Peter was dead. I can not even Imagine how Annemarie feels. As Annemarie would say “Past the Border is freedom, but there are many problems along the way” (Lowry 175). Annemarie and Ellen must hide and secretly escape Denmark before they are all dead. I should not tell to much more until you read it for yourself. In the beginning of the book you will be able to see the transition and progression of the further stages of genocide in the
Bruno is a 9 year old boy growing up in a loving, but typically authoritarian German family in the 1930?s. His father is a senior military officer who was appointed Commandant of Auschwitz? a promotion that requires upheaval from their comfortable home in Berlin to an austere home in the Polish countryside. The story explores Bruno?s difficulty in accepting and adapting to this change - especially the loss of his friends and grandparents. Boyne gives personality and family to the sort of person who today is generally demonised by western writings - the people who administered and controlled the death camps in which over 6 million Jews, Gypsies, homosexuals, and others were deemed to be grossly inferior by Hitler and his cohorts.
Somethings in history and in life needs to be put in perspective so children can understand. I watched this movie for the first time when I was about twelve and the movie showed more than i understood. It implied what happened during the time like the violence but did not show it. The older i got older, the more I could fully comprehend what was taking place during the movie. Throughout the movie you realize that most people were ignorant to the full extent to what was happening. Bruno’s mother did not know what was actually going on in her husband 's concentration camp, she did not found out until a comment from kolter about a foul smell from the
In my opinion, the most major inadequacy in The Boy in the Striped Pajamas is how John Boyne made Bruno so naïve for his age. He never really knew why Shmuel was on the other side of the fence. In the book, Bruno asked his sister, Gretel, “‘Are we Jews?’” (Boyne 182). This shows that Bruno had very little knowledge of what was really happening in Auschwitz and all around the world. Boyne had also made Bruno use a very shameful and inappropriate term in his book. Instead of “Auschwitz”, Bruno called it “Out-With”. After Boyne had added this term into his book, I felt as though he took Bruno’s naïvete way too far.
The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas, by John Boyne, significantly distorts the truth of the Holocaust in order to evoke the empathy of the audience. This response is accomplished by the author through hyperbolizing the innocence of the nine-year old protagonist, Bruno. Through the use of dramatic irony, Boyne is able to both engage and involve the audience in the events of the novel. Although it is highly improbable that a son of a German high-ranking Schutzstaffel (SS) officer would not know what a Jew is and would be unable to pronounce both Fuhrer and Auschwitz, (which he instead mispronounces as ‘Fury’ and ‘Out-with’ respectively, both of which are intentional emotive puns placed by the author to emphasize the atrocity of the events), the attribution of such information demonstrates the exaggerated innocence of Bruno and allows the audience to know and understand more than him. This permits the readers to perceive a sense of involvement, thus, allowing the audience to be subjected towards feeling more dynamic and vigorous evocation of emotions and empathy towards the characters. Fu...