Pocket full of books
Can you see the light?
Title: All The Light we cannot See
Author: Anthony Doerr
Publication Date: 2014
Publisher: Scribner
Pages: 544
Keywords: Fiction, Historical, WWII, Doerr, Andrew.
“You will all surge in the same direction at the same pace toward the same cause... you will eat country and breathe nation.”
Highly acclaimed author Anthony Doerr has succeeded again in presenting a stunningly written bestseller that won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction this year (2015). The novel is set in occupied France during WWII and centres on a German orphaned boy and a blind French girl whose paths cross.
Marie Laurie lives in Paris with her father who works for the Museum of Natural History. She loses her eyesight to cataract at the age of six and her father builds her an elaborated and perfect miniature version of their neighbourhood so she could memorise its buildings and locations by touch. Six years later the Nazis
…show more content…
Werner becomes an expert in building and fixing radios after finding a radio he became enchanted with. This wins him a place in a cruel academy for Hitler Youth. He is then assigned to track the resistance, which makes him realize humanity pays the price for his intelligence. He travels around until he finally travels into Saint-Malo where he crosses paths with Marie Laurie.
“Her outstretched fingers find an old shaving bowl, an umbrella stand, and a crate full of who-knows-what. The attic floor boards beneath her feet are as wide across as her hands. She knows from experience how much noise a person walking on them makes”
Anthony Doerr has a brilliant sense of the physical details. He enchants the readers with an amazing ability to embroider his piece with gorgeous vivid metaphors. He also succeeds in illuminating the ways of his characters to finally show that against all odds people try to find ways to be good to one
Marie-Laure Leblanc, a blind girl whom had to flee from Paris with her father, quickly learned how to adapt to a new town and eventually led to experience the war alone as a young blind girl. Marie-Laure’s story ends up corresponding to Werner Pfennig, a young orphan boy from Germany, whom has a huge fascination for radios. During the war Werner is in charge of pinpointing and destroying opposing German radio broadcasts. Towards the end of the novel the two characters ended up meeting one another through one of the radio broadcasts and despite of all of the challenges throughout the novel they were finally able to see the good in one another.
Will you join in that historic effort?” He calls out directly to the citizens, using the words “my fellow Americans” which gives the effect that he is no different than the common man, but merely an important “figure” in a suit behind a podium. He energizes the crowd, raises their morale, ignites them with confidence, “And so, my fellow Americans: ask not what America will do for you, but what together we can do for your country.” He summons us all to take part and action into changing the nation as a whole, step by step, slowly but surely. And finally, he restates it, but this time, referring to the world, “My fellow citizens of the world: ask not what America will for you, but what together we can do for the freedom of
Author of Memory Wall and About Grace, Anthony Doerr in his novel All the Light We Cannot See suggests that the less fortunate Germans during the 1940’s had little access to radio entertainment. He develops this claim by first explaining the intrigued looks on the children’s faces when Werner brings in the radio he had found buried in the dirt, then stating the radio’s condition being broken and non operating, then finally illustrating the distinct shift in the air as Werner got the radio to play even the smallest of sounds- specifically music. Doerr’s purpose is to describe the lifestyle of Germans during Hitler’s reign in order to give the readers a better understanding of the time period in which All the Light We Cannot See is written about.
In the novel Sarah’s Key by Tatiana De Rosney, the reader can see that the impact of a stranger can not only be important but also crucial for changing Julia’s life forever. The Narrator/voice has a huge impact on the novel Sarah’s Key. This fascinating story has an alternating perspective between the main characters Sarah Starzynski, a ten-year-old girl living in Paris in 1942, and Julia Jarmond, an American woman in her late forties who also lives in Paris but in the 2000’s. One morning on July 5 1942 Sarah Starzynski hears a loud knock on her door. To her surprise two French policemen stood at the door ordering them to grab whatever they needed and follow them.
-This novel takes place in France during World War II. It is about a blind girl and a German boy who meet and they both try to survive the war that was going on.
Once Werner and his crew had arrived in Saint Malo, he intercepted one of Etienne’s broadcasts of coordinates and announcements. Immediately, he recognized “the tenor of the voice matching in every respect the broadcasts of the Frenchmen” which brought memories of his childhood with Jutta. At the end of the broadcast, Werner heard Clair de Lune, a song by Debussy, and was entranced like he was again a little boy discovering the mechanisms of radios for the first time. He made the decision to not turn these broadcasters in, thus sparing the Frenchman named Etienne and Marie-Laure who was the niece of the Frenchman. After killing many innocent people, Werner spared many lives by this action, and in a sense, this worked to rectify his wrongdoings. While trapped under the Hotel of Bees, Werner had only a broken radio and the remaining members of his crew, took time to reflect upon his actions since his departure from home. He was haunted by many of his actions and felt he did not deserve redemption. Even in recognizing the wrongs he had committed, Werner was able to redeem himself; he acknowledged what the war had done to him and his deplorable actions. Werner fixed the broken radio and was able to intercept the transmissions of Marie-Laure reading from Twenty Thousands Leagues Under the Sea while Rupert von Rumpel, a dangerous German private, was rummaging throughout her house. While listening one night, he heard her say that “[von Rumpel] is here. He is right below [her] (393)”; after hearing Marie-Laure, Werner makes the decision to save her. After Werner rescued Marie-Laure, the two go their separated ways and Werner is captured. Even though Werner did not experience a physical reward, his actions of saving both Etienne and Marie-Laure worked to rectify the wrongs he has
All the light We Cannot See, by Anthony Doerr, chronicles the lives and relationship between Marie and Werner, two children who grew up in France and Germany. The society around them forces discriminatory ideals that cloud their perception of the world, but they find its meaning through their own self-definition. In this, they are both guided by a single radio and the message and legacy that it contains. Throughout the book, the author isolated the two characters, but also created subtle connections between the two. The most important of which would be the radio. It created a bond between the two where they learned from each other’s experiences and struggles. All the Light We Cannot See recreates a new picture of the world by contrasting the two separate journeys taken by Marie- Laure LeBlanc and Werner Pfennig to gain that image, which is guided by the power of a radio and the message it contains, ultimately leading to the meeting of the two characters that officially forms an image of the world where one’s actions are valued more than one’s physical features.
The book, All the Light We Cannot See, by Anthony Doerr, displays the theme of cruelty and destruction through Rumpel's greed for power and the theme of selflessness through Marie-Laure's father, Daniel, because of his love for his daughter. The antagonist in the story, Von Rumpel possesses greed for power along with an infatuation with obtaining eternal life through the Sea Flames to become more formidable, and live longer. His obsession with power resulted in him committing heinous actions such as tearing through Marie-Laure's house and becoming the selfish, immoral, ruthless creature he was. In his search to find the Sea of Flames, Von Rumple barges into Marie-Laure's house motivated to find the diamond.
“Can we forge against these enemies a grand and global alliance, North and South, East and West, that can assure a more fruitful life for all mankind?”
I chose All the Light We Cannot See because I’m really interested in reading,or learning,anything about World War II, so it was a perfect pick for me since the book was based around the World War II time period. I must admit, the book was extremely long and I did have a hard time forcing myself to pick up the book and continue reading it. It felt like it would never end. Fortunately, the author’s writing style was really descriptive and you can easily see whatever the character saw, or heard whatever the characters heard. The fact that I could easily see the cities Anthony Doerr described,or hear the oceans he made the characters hear, really helped me continue reading the book until I finished it.
Werner likes to please people, but not the right people. Werner builds radios for the Nazis, and they praise him for it, for instance, “Werner sets up the first transceiver, uses measuring tape to pace off two hundred meters, and sets up a second. He uncoils the grounding wires, raises the aerials, and switches them on. Already his fingers are numb… Werner puts on the headset and fills his ears with static…. “I have him sir.” Hauptmann starts smiling in ernest. The dogs caper and sneeze with excitement.” (Doerr 244-245). By the reaction that Werner’s
The Holocaust was one of the most devastating moments in history. In WW2, The Nazi Party had occupied over eleven European countries, and the genocide of over eleven million Jews had brought a swarm of hatred leading to Adolf Hitler. “Rose Blanche” is a historical fiction text, written by Roberti Innocenti. This children’s book is about an innocent girl who gets into a predicament involving the current war. Conclusively, Rose Blanche is an innocent child loves to explore and wander around, yet the ongoing war has affected the way she lives in many ways.
Put aside your stance on homosexuality, and put yourself into the shoes of someone who is a homosexual. Imagine how you would feel if the world did not accept who you are as a person because you are different. Only because you didn’t find the opposite sex attractive to you. In Jonathan Safran Foer’s book Everything is illuminated we find out that Alex confesses his love for Jonathan near the end of the book as he becomes more comfortable with Jonathan. Why does Alex not tell Jonathan from the beginning? Is he uncomfortable being open that he is a homosexual?
Moreover, All the Light We Cannot See began betwixt the notorious Nazi Party’s reign in Europe. Going back and forth between time periods, settings, and characters, the book, in the end, composes a mellifluous symphony of parallels that all eventually connect. Marie-Laure LeBlanc, a legally blind girl who continually viewed the glass as half-full, was accompanied by her father, Daniel LeBlanc, throughout the preceding portion of her pilgrimage to refuge during WWII. By fleeing unavoidable harm and siege in Paris, Marie-Laure and her father walked, by foot, to the island city of Saint Malo, France. The pair brought along a sacred, irreplaceable stone: the Sea of Flames from the Museum of Natural History in Paris, where Marie-Laure’s father previously worked. Finally reaching
Ophelia woke up to the sound of rain drizzling down her window. Up from her wooden bed, it creaked and she put on some nicer clothes. She looked through her window, and the rain wasn’t so bad, but she didn’t feel like having any customers right now. She walked over to her door and went to flip her sign over to OPEN to CLOSED, realizing it was already flipped to the CLOSED side, and left it alone. She was bare foot, and didn’t want splinters on her feet again, as almost all her house was made out of trees. She hurried to her bedside on put on her boots on and made some breakfast.