The Boy In The Striped Pyjamas Essay

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The text in question is “The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas”. The Author of the text is John Boyne and it was published in 2006. The novel gives the reader insight into the German Holocaust and persecution of the Jews. John Boyne uses Irony for deliberate effect to position the reader to reflect on their senselessness of discrimination and its devastating consequences. Boyne highlights this assertion by detailing a German officer’s son using the skills of a Jew to heal him and that the same boy befriends a Jewish boy.

Boyne identifies that a German Officer’s Son benefits from the skills of a Jewish doctor and that his Mother conceals this benefit from his father. Boyne raises a salient point by highlighting that German people can benefit from the people that they are mercilessly killing. The passage in the novel maximises its impact by using the Son of the German Commandant to receive the benefit. Boyne writes, “If the Commandant asks, we’ll say that I cleaned Bruno up” (pg.85, The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas). Bruno’s Mother chooses love and healing for her son …show more content…

Boyne is highlighting that two young boys who don’t comprehend the atrocities of their environment, can forge a friendship from different sides of the fence. The Commanding Officers Son has formed and grown to be best friends with a Jew who the commandant and the Germans are discriminating against. “If it wasn’t for the fact that Bruno was nowhere near as skinny as the boys on his side of the fence, and not quite as pale either, it would have been difficult to tell them apart” (pg.204, The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas). Boyne identifies that children are unaware of adult agendas and can enjoy a friendship whilst one party actively attacks the other. It highlights that people are equal and that hate is an acquired

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