Proverb Assignment: A Night Divided

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Proverb Assignment: A Night Divided

Have you ever wondered what it would be like to live in East Berlin at the time when the Berlin Wall was up and Germany was still split between West and East? Jennifer A. Nielsen’s standalone book, A Night Divided, explains life through twelve year old Gerta’s point of view. Her family’s escape story can teach us many things even if they are not a real life family. The many struggles and victories that they experienced can teach the reader life lessons as well as educate them on life in East Berlin during the time the Berlin Wall was in place.

Gerta’s family, like many other families in Berlin, had been split with the construction of the wall. She, her mother, and her older brother, Fritz, struggle to live a normal life in communist controlled East Berlin. Her and her family had always secretly hated the GDR, German Democratic Republic, and had hoped to leave while they had the chance before something bad happened so they are seen as a possible enemy to the state, mostly because of a strike her father was a part of long ago. After the wall went up, years went by and she hadn't heard anything from her dear father and brother, Dominic until on her way to …show more content…

The proverb, “where there's a will, there's a way”, mostly describes Gerta's stubbornness and determination that keeps her family digging through all of the hard troubles. In order to persuade her brother, Fritz to agree to the tunneling plan Gerta said,”If you are going to escape, then we need a way for all of us to escape. We’re a family, Fritz. Half of us are already on the other side. If we’re going to cross, to be together, it has to be all of us.” (119). Gerta Lowe knew that any risk was worth if it meant getting her family reunited in the

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