Post #7 Prefontaine, America’s Greatest Running Legend Vs the Book Thief

    You make think this is some random kid writing a post relating a holocaust book and a book about a runner and you may think they have nothing in common but that is where you are wrong. This book is based upon the short life of Steve Prefontaine. Steve grew up in the little town of Coos Bay, Oregon, United States and he was German blood. During all of Steve’s childhood he was teased, bullied and beaten because of where he came from. Steve was born quite a bit after the second world war but he was still subjected to the harsh racism of Germans. Pre was what he was known by had his own belief in things. Steve quotes “Some people create with words or with music or with a brush and paints. I like to make something beautiful when i run. I like to make people stop and say ‘i’ve never seen run like that before.’ It’s more than just a race, it’s style. It’s doing something better than anyone else. It’s being creative.” The similarities between the Book Thief and Pre are that both issues of injustice are racism. Book Thief it is racism towards Jews and in Pre it is racism towards Germans. Also during the book Steve travels to Helsinki, Finland to race against the worlds fastest and he is not allowed to race for he is an amateur athlete and the Amateur Athletics Union (AAU) forbids amateur athletes to race against pros therefore he does not race and is treated unfairly by the AAU. The other similarity is that in the Book Thief several of the main characters die and in Pre, STeve dies in a car crash before he goes to the Montreal Olympics. Both stories have unsatisfying ending and they make you want to cry.

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Post #6 Is the ending of your novel satisfying? Why or why not?

  The ending of the story is satisfying and it isn’t. The reason the story is satisfying is because Liesel gets to see Hans come back from war before the explosion. She also gets to see Max for after the explosion and after the town is rebuilt Max comes into the Rudy’s father shop and says hello and goodbye. Liesel gets to say goodbye to her close Jewish friend but doesn’t get to say goodbye to her family. The disappointing part about this story is that all of Liesel’s family and a majority of her friends are killed in a bombing. She does not get to say goodbye to Rudy, her love interest but she did kiss Rudy and she did show her emotions even though he was dead and he could not show his emotions back. After she kisses him you finally feel that she would feel complete and happy that he got the kiss he waited his whole life for.  She doesn’t get the chance to properly thank and say goodbye to her foster parents who loved her. Although all of the happiness is shadowed by the darkness and sadness it does exist. I also found it satisfying that she took her fathers accordion and kept it. I am sure that would have meant a lot to her father. After losing her family she moves on and doesn’t always waste her life thinking about her loss. She ends up getting married and having children and grand-children.

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Post #5 How is some of the harm the characters experience repaired in your novel?

  Some of the harm is repaired by Max coming back. When Max leaves Liesel and Hans feel to blame for they helped other Jews and so when they don’t see him they are upset. She sees him walk through Molching in the Jew parade. She fears losing her friend. After the war she sees him again and this time he is freed from the concentration camp and so he can freely speak to her and he can be friends with her. There is a very small description about Max’s visit to Liesel. The harm seems to be repaired between Liesel and Max but they only seem to talk for a split second. The book says “Liesel came out. They hugged and cried and fell to the floor.” (Zusak, pg 549)   He put such little effort into this part and so much effort into the rest. This quote is so simple and to the point it just says that they talked and hugged. The resolution is very subtle but it does exist. You do not find out if they spend the rest of their lives together. The harm of Rudy never getting a kiss is solved by Liesel kissing him in order to wake him but it does not work. Rudy waits his whole life for a kiss from Liesel and of course she kisses him when he is dead. Also Liesel’s fear of abandonment is actually worsened due to the fact that her foster parents and almost all of her close friends are killed. She feels completely alone and lost until she sees Max again.

 

 

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Post#4 Write A PMI for this book.

Positives	Negatives	Interesting facts
– brilliantly written- characters are described expertly for you really connect with and like the characters. – packed with exciting events from the track race to the book robberies to the farm robberies – storyline was very good  about an illiterate girl in Nazi Germany whose brother just died and she has such a bad desire to read that she steals books. She goes to live with  foster parents and then a Jew comes along and they hide him in their basement -creates pathos in the reader with the struggles -favourite book so far	– all of the characters die in the end but the main two characters die of natural cause- a lot of German words which made it harder at points but there was never more than a sentence. -anti-Semitism killing several Jews -not a fast read	-based in Nazi Germany during WWII- Hitler Youth Groups which is basically the same thing as Scouts and Girl-guides but they were training the kids more like they were soldiers instead of teaching them to have fun and basic life skills – Zusak kills all of the characters in his book by a bomb except Max and Liesel but death still gets them in the end – the perspective of death as a narrator was a fascinating original way to tell the story. -the book is written by an Australian Author talking about the perspective in Nazi Germany during WWII

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Post #3 Do you think your characters are coping well with their problems?

   I think the majority of the characters are coping well with their problems. Hans has always been calm but he is handling his problem poorly. His problem is being nice to the Jew for he felt sympathy for them for the Jew fell to the ground and couldn’t get up because he was hungry. Hans was punished for this action by becoming a Nazi and having to be sent off to war in Russia. He does not want to have to kill innocent civilians or Jews for they have done nothing wrong. He disagrees with Hitler. Liesel is handling her problem of being illiterate and missing her brother very well after awhile at her foster parents. Ever since she arrived she has been having bad dreams of her brother which causes her to wet her bed and from that began stealing books. Every time she awoke from her bed her step father would be there and he would help her read and get to the appropriate level of reading. Max solves his problem of being a Jew in Nazi Germany by constantly running away from the Nazi’s and hiding with either the Hubermann’s or Walter Kugler. He also continuously fights Hitler in his dreams which ends his battle mentally but not physically. This works for awhile until Hans feeds the hungry, dying Jew on the street. After this incident, Max finds it too dangerous for him to live in the basement so he runs away before the Nazi’s get suspicious.

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Post #2 How are characters reacting differently to experiences of injustice?

     In this book Max reacts to the issue of injustice of anti-Semitism by running away from the Nazi’s and technically putting a normal German family in danger. He seems selfish leaving his family but if you had the choice of dying or living you would choose to live. Most of the sub characters saw Jews to be an inferior group for they believe in a different religion than everyone else does and because Hitler didn’t like them. Those characters are wrong in the eyes of Hans for he has seen the potential behind a Jew and he knows that they are humans too. One part in the book he gives a piece of bread to a Jew walking through the town as they are being lead to their death and he gets caught by a Nazi soldier. Ever since that day he is constantly afraid about the Nazi’s coming and taking him away from his family and being imprisoned. After this incident everyone treats Hans badly and ridicules him as a Jew lover. Liesel agrees with her adopted father in the fact that she realizes that the Jews are being treated unfairly and that all the things Hitler is doing are wrong. The Jewish stores constantly get their windows smashed along with slangs and swastika’s drawn on their doors and walls. Hans constantly paints over the vandalized buildings hoping that the Jews will be treated fairly one day.

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What is the issue of injustice in the “Book Thief”?

  

  The biggest issue of injustice in this book is the subject of anti-Semitism and racism towards Jewish people. During World War II, Hitler is in control and every one bows to him whether they believe in his ways or not. If they disagree they will be put into jail or terminated. Hitler believed that people with a Jewish belief were a lower class and he was afraid of them so he placed all of the Jews into concentration camps and slowly killed them. One of the main characters is Max Vandenburg who has been running from the Nazi’s his whole life due to the fact that he is Jewish. He moves in with the Hubermann’s and changes their lives. Hans Hubermann who houses this Jew from the Nazi’s doesn’t want to be a Nazi for he was saved by a Jew during a previous war. Because Hans doesn’t want to be a Nazi he is treated unfairly. The issue of injustice reminds me of the injustice towards the East Indian in the “Kite Runner” and the segregation in that story. One character gets beat up for his race and is treated unfairly. The book thief reminds me of the slavery and disrespect towards African American’s in the U.S.  “Some crunched numbers. In 1933, 90 percent of Germans showed unflinching support for Adolf Hitler. That leaves 10 percent who didn’t. Hans Hubermann belonged to the 10 percent.” (pg 63)  This quote is important because it shows that the majority of Germans agreed with Hitler’s choices only because they didn’t want to be punished if they did not agree. This shows that Germans supported the anti-Semitism and wrongs applied to the Jews.

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