Have you ever played hide and seek, knowing that the penalty for being found may be death? During the Nazi era, people were forced into hiding, unaware of how long they would be there or if they would be found, or killed. The movie The Book Thief is accurate in its portrayal of Germany’s government under Adolf Hitler, life for families during the Nazi era, and Germany’s overall setting during this time period. The Book Thief accurately depicts Adolf Hitler as a cruel, dictator of Nazi Germany. Everyday life for families in the movie was very accurate for this period as well, considering they lived off of scarce food and little money. Finally, the setting and scenery shown in the movie were identical to that of real Germany. In these ways, the …show more content…
He was unliked by many, because of his radical dictatorship. He had several radical ideas that put many people in danger. Hitler proposed The Holocaust, also known as the Final Solution to murder about 6 million Jews (Biesinger). It was a plan with only one outcome in mind. Hitler also ordered troops to invade other neighboring countries, creating the largest and most destructive war fought in all of human history (World). As a cruel ruler, he wanted to eliminate anyone that threatened him or opposed his religious or political views. Many groups were targeted during this time period because of their ideas, views, or ethnic background, especially those of Jewish descent. Hitler saw all Jews as naturally evil and requested for their immediate “removal” (Holocaust). He couldn’t guarantee that all Jews would be killed. Many German people did everything they could to prevent the killing of Jews. In fact, ideas were approved by Hitler including breaking into houses to insure nobody could be hidden and saved (Holocaust). Many families tried everything they could, but they were hard tasks to follow through on. Families had to buy extra food and clothes, and had to keep it all a secret. In some cases, neighbors found out because of unusual activities (The). Neighbors looked out for extra grocery bags, lights being turned on and off, and suspicious activities (The). The movie accurately depicts Hitler’s cruel actions and harsh ideas proposed in
A example why people are brutal in The Book Thief is when the bomber planes were dropping bombs on the small town killing many people. My thoughts on this is even though the Nazi started this doesn’t mean they should kill innocent families.
The Book Thief and Nazi Germany The heavily proclaimed novel “The Book Thief” by Markus Zusak is a great story that can help you understand what living in Nazi Germany was like. Throughout the story, the main character, Liesel goes through many hardships to cope with a new life in a new town and to come to the recognition of what the Nazi party is. Liesel was given up for adoption after her mother gave her away to a new family, who seemed harsh at first, but ended up being the people who taught her all the things she needed to know. Life with the new family didn’t start off good, but the came to love them and her new friend, Rudy.
The Jewish people were targeted, hunted, tortured, and killed, just for being Jewish, Hitler came to office on January 20, 1933; he believed that the German race had superiority over the Jews in Germany. The Jewish peoples’ lives were destroyed; they were treated inhumanly for the next 12 years, “Between 1933 and 1945, more than 11 million men, women, and children were murdered in the Holocaust. Approximately six million of these were Jews” (Levy). Hitler blamed a lot of the problems on the Jewish people, being a great orator Hitler got the support from Germany, killing off millions of Jews and other people, the German people thought it was the right thing to do. “To the anti-Semitic Nazi leader Adolf Hitler, Jews were an inferior race, an alien threat to German racial purity and community” (History.com Staff).
Anti-Semitism was influencing the minds of ordinary German civilians. Adolf Hitler had previously been in prison before he became ruler of Germany in his second attempt. During the time he was in prison, he wrote a book called 'Mien Kamph'. His book was incredibly racist. Anti-Semitic, Hitler expressed his hatred for the Jews and influenced his readers into hating these 'impure' people.
Hitler was able to convince and almost brainwash people into believing that what he told them was the truth. He was a very skilled public speaker and he used this skill to distort the truth as it suited him, this was to his advantage. A twenty-five point programme was set up by the nazi party and was designed to appeal to all german people and all sections of their society; it included racist ideas and conveys hatred of non germans. He used the jewish people as scapegoats and blaimed them for all the problems in germany, he encouraged the german public to take on this opinion also. He used the method of force to make people belive he was powerful and his
If you were a German citizen during World War II, do you think you would be a Nazi? Most people would say no even though, in actuality, most people would be. It is because people need to succumb to societal expectations to survive in a society such as that of Germany during WWII and in the book, The Book Thief, this theme of individual versus society is explored with people complying and fighting social expectations. Sometimes people side with the Nazi Party out of fear of being targeted and other times fight against Nazi Party because of love for their family and fellow man with usually terrible consequences. In The Book Thief, the theme of the individual versus society is shown many times with characters conforming and defying social expectations.
Hitler saw that most of Germany didn’t fit this picture at all, so he decided to solve it in one of the most awful ways possible. The mass murder, or Holocaust of over six million Jews, and long with the innocent Blacks, Gays, Gypsies, and both physically and mentally Handicapped. He mostly targeted the Jewish because in World War II, the Jewish was the main reason why Germany lost in World War II. This mass murder lasted over years and years of murder, forced lab...
World War II was a grave event in the twentieth century that affected millions. Two main concepts World War II is remembered for are the concentration camps and the marches. These marches and camps were deadly to many yet powerful to others. However, to most citizens near camps or marches, they were insignificant and often ignored. In The Book Thief, author Markus Zusak introduces marches and camps similar to Dachau to demonstrate how citizens of nearby communities were oblivious to the suffering in those camps during the Holocaust.
Germany was humiliated. Although Hitler was born and raised in Austria, he loved and desired his homeland in Germany. This inspired him to begin campaigning for ultimate power in 1919. Before the Holocaust, but during WWII Hitler had a passion to rebuild Germany. It did not matter whom he stepped on to do so. Adolf started to blame Jews for most everything. Germany started referring to those of Jewish religion as “Vermons” (David 4-5). Jews would later be restricted and removed from
After Germany lost World War I, it was in a national state of humiliation. Their economy was in the drain, and they had their hands full paying for the reparations from the war. Then a man named Adolf Hitler rose to the position of Chancellor and realized his potential to inspire people to follow. Hitler promised the people of Germany a new age; an age of prosperity with the country back as a superpower in Europe. Hitler had a vision, and this vision was that not only the country be dominant in a political sense, but that his ‘perfect race’, the ‘Aryans,’ would be dominant in a cultural sense. His steps to achieving his goal came in the form of the Holocaust. The most well known victims of the Holocaust were of course, the Jews. However, approximately 11 million people were killed in the holocaust, and of those, there were only 6 million Jews killed. The other 5 million people were the Gypsies, Pols, Political Dissidents, Handicapped, Jehovah’s witnesses, Homosexuals and even those of African-German descent. Those who were believed to be enemies of the state were sent to camps where they were worked or starved to death.
Excluding all the tragic things Hitler did, this shows life through his eyes. Adolf Hitler was a Nazi German leader who attempted genocide and was part of one of the worst wars, WWII. Hitler took up the role of initiating the Holocaust, which ended up in the death of numerous Jews. Hitler did not do particularly well in school, leaving formal education in 1905. Unable to settle into a regular job, he drifted.
All the actions that he took to build a perfect Germany mirrored Machiavelli’s teaching of the ends justifying the means. Hitler created death camps called concentration camps, in which he would send Jews and all other people he deemed unfit to die (Axelrod 2). Horrifying experiments would occur in these camps as all the Jews and people there were treated like animals. Hitler believed that anything was okay as long as Germany would be successful. Through this, a lot of fear was associated with Hitler’s name which he was fine with.
As time evolves, so do the words that are essential for our everyday survival. The most obvious difference between humans and animals is our ability to master the art of speech. Often, people will say the “sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me”, a simple nursery rhyme that helps ease a bullied child from abusive words and taunts. But does that really help cure the emotional pain? Words can illuminate and motivate the minds of people but can also shadow their self-esteem through psychological trauma. In The Book Thief, we see how fundamental words were to shape the reality of millions of people caught in the fire of World War II.
Death states that, “I’m always finding humans at their best and worst. I see their ugly and their beauty, and I wonder how the same thing can be both” (Zusak 491). This book shows us human doing things that weren’t even imaginable before this point. Many people give into ideas that were lies. But, we also watch a few people go out of their way and sacrifice everything for a man they barely even know. They do everything they can to keep him safe and alive. They work harder, the get another job, and they even steal. In Markus Zusak’s The Book Thief, death examines the ugliness and the beauty of humans.
German citizens had to endure a challenging lifestyle, presented by Adolf Hitler, of fascism, the holocaust, Jewish laws and propaganda during World War II. From 1939-1942, Nazi Germany affected the lives of Jews, Gypsies, Slavic people, and other groups living in Germany by getting rid of the undesirables, known as the Holocaust. Only Germans with the look of blond hair and blue eyes were even considered to live, only if he or she had no defects or disabilities, anyone else was sent to and killed in concentration camps. The Book Thief takes place in a town near Munich, Germany during this time of the holocaust. The novel focuses on the lives of the people and how they cope and deal with the immediate effects of WWII. It emphasizes the danger of hiding a Jew in a family’s basement, and how they are constantly paranoid of being caught.