The world is a dangerous place to live; not because of the people who are evil but because of the people who don't do anything about it. In Markus Zusak's The Book Thief, we see demonization is utilized to gain power numerous times through the use of the characters in the book. This book develops the theme of Horrors of Humanity.by showing the demonization through the use of power, in which concludes to Viktor Chemmel being the leader of the stealing gang, Franz Deutscher being the leader of the Hitler youth group, and even Liesel Meminger being involved with thievery and standing up for herself. All of these characters are uniquely different, yet still the same. In the novel, Viktor Chemmel, who is the replacement of Arthur Berg in the …show more content…
stealing gang Liesel and Rudy are apart of. Viktor uses demonization through vulgar language, and painful physical contact to dehumanize and be in control of a person which allows him to gain and wield power. In Part 5, Rudy is furious about the apples the gang and him collected, which triggers Viktor to become angry “Viktor came casually closer again and faced him. He gave him a gentle rub on the arm. A whisper. "Unless you want me to turn that blood into a fountain, I suggest you go away, little boy." He looked at Liesel. "And take the little slut with you."” (Zusak 276). and just how vile and cruel he could be. He mentioned that Rudy is a little boy, yet Viktor is barely older than him. He took advantage of his power he had, which was being the leader of the stealing gang to overpower the other members of the gang. This shows the idea; Horrors of Humanity by the use of his evil ways to gain more power. The root of all evil is the abuse of power. Franz Deutscher who is also a leader like Viktor, but of the Hitler youth group, sets a prime example of someone who uses demonization to wield and gain power over his members by dehumanizing them . “You ape—what's wrong with you? Tommy slouched fearfully back, but his left cheek still managed to twitchin amanic, cheerful contortion.” (Zusak 269). Through the use of Franz words, Tommy is left in fear and disbelief in what his leader has said to him. This shows how mean and evil a person could be through the use of words . Since Franz is the leader of his group, he uses his vulgar language and mean words to terrorize others. This also links back to the theme Horrors of Humanity because he abuses the power he has to negatively impact others. Surprisingly, Liesel is a major asset when it comes to using demonization to gain and wield power over others.
In the beginning of the book, Liesel is seen as an innocent uneducated young girl, but then starts to go through numerous tragedies. Such as the death of her brother, abandonment of her mother and the absence of her real father. Liesel then starts to steal and read books as an escapism because of the loss of her brother. She then joins a stealing gang, in which she continues to steal fruits, vegetables and other important foods from farms. “Twenty-four hours later, Liesel and Rudy braved the wire fence again and filled their sack. The problem showed up as they made their getaway. Christ! shouted Arthur. The farmer! It was his next word, however, that frightened. He called it out as if he’d already been attacked with it. His mouth ripped open. The word flew out, and the word was ax.” (Zusak 164). Liesel is now taking the food she steals for granted, in which she does not care if she gets in trouble. She is simply acting out. This leads her to doing wrongful things to gain more power, like stealing more books from the mayor's library to gain more knowledge. “The injury of words. Yes, the brutality of words. She summoned them from someplace she only now recognized and hurled them at Ilsa Hermann. “It’s about time,” she informed her, “that you do your stinking washing anyway. It’s about time you faced the fact that your son is dead. He got killed! He got strangled and
cut up more than twenty years ago! Or did he freeze to death? Either way, he’s dead! He’s dead and it’s pathetic that you sit here shivering in your own house to suffer for it. You think you’re the only one?” (Zusak 262). This shows how horrible and mean she could be through the use of her words, which developed power for herself. She stood up for herself, which resulted in harsh behaviour. In conclusion, we see that evil and demonization is used frequently through the characters in the book. If you want to test one's character, give one power. All expressed differently we see Viktor Chemmel being the leader of the stealing gang, Franz Deutscher being the leader of the Hitler youth group, and even Liesel Meminger being involved with thievery. These are the three people who prove to utilize demonization to gain and wield power over others.
Part One: The first book that Liesel “stole” was The Grave Digger's Handbook. This is ironic because it was the day that her brother died and it was the last time she saw her mother. Himmel Street is ironic because Himmel= Heaven and Himmel Street did
Throughout the novel Liesel reaches new highs and new lows, overcoming her fears and succumbing to her anger. Liesel's sudden outburst at Ilsa Hermann after Ilsa asking to stop the laundry services caused her to finally accept her brother's death and even helped Ilsa accept her son's death as well. Ilsa's guilt consumed her and caused her to become a house ridden woman overcome by her grief while Liesel overcame her guilt and grief by learning how to read and write not allowing them to overcome her. "“It’s about time,” she [Liesel] informed her, “that you do your own stinking washing anyway. It’s about time you faced the fact that your son is dead. He got killed! He got strangled and cut up more than twenty years ago! Or did he freeze to death? Either way, he’s dead! He’s dead and it’s pathetic that you sit here shivering in your own house to suffer for it. You think you’re the only one?” Immediately. Her brother was next to her. He whispered for her to stop, but he, too, was dead, and not worth listening to. He died in a train. They buried him in the snow. […] “This book,” she went on. She shoved the boy down the steps, making him fall. “I don’t want it.” The words were quieter now, but still just as hot. She threw The Whistler at the woman’s slippered feet, hearing the clack of it as it landed on the cement. “I don’t want your miserable book. ”[…] her brother holding his
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.
In this passage, Liesel just stopped beating up Ludwig Schmeikl and Tommy Muller. Liesel is mad because she is learning how to read with Hans but can’t prove it to her classmates that she can read so they think she is stupid. Liesel tries to defend herself not by proving that she’s not stupid but with violence instead, much like how Hitler handled the Jews with killing them and destroying their homes.
Not even the most powerful Germans could keep up with the deaths of so many people, and to this day there is no single wartime document that contains the numbers of all the deaths during the Holocaust. Although people always look at the numbers of people that were directly killed throughout the Holocaust, there were so many more that were affected because of lost family. Assuming that 11 million people died in the Holocaust, and half of those people had a family of 3, 16.5 million people were affected by the Holocaust. Throughout the books and documentaries that we have watched, these key factors of hate and intolerance are overcome. The cause of the Holocaust was hate and intolerance, and many people fighting against it overcame this hate
In The Book Thief, author Markus Zusak tells the tragic story of Liesel Meminger and her experiences in 1939 Nazi Germany. Zuzak incorporates compelling literary devices such as toe curling foreshadowing, personification, and vivid imagery in the form of simile and metaphors to grasp the readers’ interest. Zusak’s use of various literary devices helps to deepen the text and morals of the story, and makes the dramatic historical novel nearly impossible to put down.
To begin, I personally don’t believe Liesel is wrong for stealing a book from the bonfire because it was going to be destroyed anyways. It shouldn’t harm or have a huge impact on someone else. The book could have been thrown out by someone who did not want it anymore. Her family cannot really afford books and Liesel is
Rosa is the one to jump to this conclusion, "I bet it started with the snowman -fooling around with ice and snow in the cold down there" (Zusak 315). Rosa primes Liesel's guilt by identifying that the ice could possibly be the source of Max's' illness. This identification causes Liesel to feel guilt as she questions herself, "Why did I have to bring all that snow down" (Zusak 316). Liesel seems to feel guilt stronger in this situation considering she turkey cares about Max. Liesel directly displays her guilt when she clenches her hands, "She clenched her hands, as if to pray" (Zusak 316). This shows that she feels guilty for her actions and results in her praying for Max’s
Liesel’s slow development of the power of words causes her to experience the negative effects of words and misery on many occasions throughout her lifetime.
Many characters in The Book Thief by Markus Zusak develop a comprehension of the strength of power woulds possess which causes them to be undesirably affected.
“I am haunted by humans” (Zusak 550). The Book Thief by Markus Zusak is about the horrors of World War II. Liesel and her family help out an old friend by hiding a Jew. Liesel also steals her first book when she at her brother’s funeral. Liesel Meminger’s remarkable actions like feeling good when she steals a book and her family hiding a Jew help demonstrate why Death is “haunted by humans”.
We watch death explore the beauty and ugliness of the human race in Markus Zusak’s book The Book Thief. We watch as Liesel, Hans, and Rosa do everything they can to help out a group of people who were treated with such disrespect during this time period. This group, the Jews, were beaten for taking food that was given to them, and when they died no one would even care. But, these few people gave them food, a place to hide, a sense of belonging, and and a reason to live. They have to work day and night, and do everything they can. Even though people aren’t so beautiful at all times, there is still hope. As we have learned in this book that even when 99 percent of humans aren’t so marvelous there is still that one percent that is to delightful that it would touch anyones heart.
In The Book Thief, by Markus Zusak, beauty and brutality is seen in many of the characters. Rudy, Liesel, and Rosa display examples of beauty and brutality often without realizing what exactly they are doing, because it is a part of their human nature. Zusak not only uses his characters, but also the setting of the novel in Nazi Germany to allude to his theme of the beauty and brutality of human nature. The time in which the novel is set, during World War II, displays great examples of beauty and brutality, such as the mistreatment of the Jews. As a result of this time period, the characters have to go through troubling times, which reveals their beautiful and brutal nature in certain circumstances. Zusak uses his characters and their experiences to demonstrate the theme of the beauty and brutality of human nature in the novel.
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.
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. World War II was a war of atomic bombs, sudden deaths, and most importantly, a war of words. Both Allies and axis countries depended on mass communication and media to convey the different messages, words of hate, hope, and patriotic service they needed to say to manipulate the minds of their people. The Book Thief uses the power of communication to heal, protect and help fight the injustice that existed at the time of the book. Throughout the narrative, the author conveys the best and worst ways that language can be used.