Liesel Meminger In The Book Thief By Markus Zusak

In The Book Thief, Liesel Meminger is a caring person. When her foster father, Hans Hubermann, is lecturing Liesel about not telling anyone that they are hiding a jew named Max in their basement; Liesel starts crying. Hans tell her that if she speaks of Max, himself and Liesel’s foster mother Rosa, will be taken away and they will never come back. Liesel starts bawling at this point in the lecture. This shows how much she really cares about her family. Liesel cares about the people that she loves and their presence in her life. Liesel cares about others and fights for justice when she sees someone being treated unfairly. One example of this is when Liesel stands up for Rudy when she sees Victor beating him up and giving him a bloody nose.

In the movie, she is just a sharp kid scribbling down judgments that she sees. For example, in the movie she wrote “boy with ringlets and tattoos”. In the book, she writes what she thinks of people’s life based on their physical appearances: “I bet

and memory and the past. She is one of the most interesting characters in the book.

The Book Thief is a historical novel written by Markus Zusak. It provides the readers a deeper understanding of the lives of Jews and Germans in Germany during the brutal Nazi regime and how they manage to survive. This includes not only the physical survival of the fittest, but also the survival of their moral beliefs. In addition to the author’s theme of inhumanity and humanity of man, he provides a background story for the characters in the book and how they are similar and different by their moral beliefs, their goals, their guilt, and their relationship with words. Two of the characters that are mentioned throughout the book to remind the readers of their struggles to survive in the Third Reich are Liesel and Max. Liesel is the foster daughter of Hans and Rosa Hubermann and “the book thief” who realizes the power of words in the Nazi community while Max is a fist fighter and German Jew who hides in Hans’s basement to escape from Nazi incarceration and eventually survives the concentration camp after he is arrested on his way to Stuttgart by the Nazis. Liesel and Max can be compared and contrasted through analyzing their struggles, includes their fear of the death, their guilt of

Liesel Meminger is a main character described in “The Book Thief”. After her mother can no longer support her Liesel and her brother, although he does not make the journey, are sent to a foster home in a small town in Germany called Munich were Liesel meets Hans and Rosa Hubermann or Mama and Papa. Although the initial warming up is hard Liesel soon becomes very close to her Papa. “Over the next few weeks and into summer, the midnight class began at the end of each nightmare” (Zusak,69). Hans teaches Liesel each night how to read and write to ease her mind when all Liesel can think about is her dead brother. Hans truly becomes Papa when Liesel trusts Hans will never let her be

of why she's apprehensive of the books, other than that because the society says she should be.

The book is organized in a topical manner. Which means that the chapters appear in collections of stories revolving around a specific topic, rather than in a chronological order. Some of these chapters revolve around her education, her siblings, and what happened after her interpreting session in the psychologist’s office. As mentioned before, she stopped interpreting. In fact, she stops doing much of anything as she contemplates her unhappy childhood. But soon after this event, her sister’s wedding is planned, and she is forced to confront her past at the wedding. She enjoys herself, but resents that she still needs to interpret for her parents.

An incredibly important aspect in the Book Thief are books. The books are used for the plot of the book but also they were used as a symbol for many things including Liesel’s ability to read and write, Liesel’s character, and Liesel’s ability to use words during the story. The first aspect that books symbolize in The Book Thief is Liesel’s ability to read and write. Close to the beginning of the story, Liesel found The Gravedigger’s Handbook during her brother’s funeral.

Liesel Meminger, coined “The Book Thief”, exhibits extraordinary acts of courage within the literary work. Since birth, Meminger has faced hardships; she deals with the absence of her father, the death of her younger brother, and the abandonment by her mother all within several years. These adversities lead to the development of Meminger’s courageous nature, which she displays throughout the novel. Acts of her courage include stealing books and trusting the Hubermanns After attending her brother’s funeral, Liesel notices that one of the gravediggers has dropped a novel. Looking around to make sure no one is watching her, she collects the book and hides it; stealing this book ignites the fire and desire inside of her to learn how to read and expand her knowledge. After Liesel Meminger arrives to the Hubermanns’ house in Molching, Germany, she has to be coaxed out of the car. Finally, Hans Hubermann, later known as Papa, is the successor in luring the child out of the car, he immediately gains her trust, unlike his cold counterpart, Rosa Hubermann. Despite Rosa’s foul mouth and direct orders, “Saumensch. You call me Mama when you talk to me” (Zusak 35), Liesel eventually learns to trust and love her. Learning to love and to trust the Hubermanns shows how courageous Liesel truly is since she had previously faced the abandonment/death of two parents.

In this journal I will tell you about the three most important searches in the book. I find those three are Liesel searching for books, Max searching for a way to survive, and Rudy searching for a kiss. The first search I find important is Liesel searching for more books. Liesel has stolen three books by now. Her dad got her some, but when she finds the chance to take a good book,

manner. Her book is well written and is a refreshing change to the one sided

The Book Thief by Markus Zusak is about a young girl named Liesel who goes through a series of emotional traumatizing experiences that involves in her losing those she really loves and cares for. An example of this was at the very beginning of the book when her brother dies from a fever and her mother leaves her to be adopted. The main character Liesel goes through a series of positive and negative events that molded her to becoming the character she becomes by the end of the novel. One of whose series of events that is relevant and also contributes towards molding Liesel’s character would be when she becomes an orphan in the beginning of the book, learns how to read, and her reunion with Max.

Liesel Meminger aka the book thief is not any ordinary kid. She lived without a father and lost both her mother and brother at the age of 9, while being sent away to a new family the Hubermann at the Himmel Street. In the Hubermann's home Liesel finds two loving, caring, and opposite people, Hans and Rosa Hubermann who would help and teach her to survive and grow. While foster mother, Rosa is loud, harsh, and likes to use the word saumensch or female pig to address Liesel, foster father Hans is softer and shows more affectionate to Liesel.

Liesel Meminger, the main character in The Book Thief by Markus Zusak, is a very complex and deep character. Throughout the almost six year span of her life starting from age nine covered by this novel, Liesel not only grows intellectually and physically, but as a whole person. Physically when Liesel arrived on Himmel Street as a foster child, “everything about her was undernourished” (Zusak, 31). Death described even her smile as hungry. Liesel was depicted with “Her hair was a close enough brand of German blond, but she had dangerous eyes.

Her strong vocabulary and emotional appeals target the reader's emotions directly. Everyone can relate to friendship, home, and food. For many, those are all emotional things. She also incorporates some of the negative emotions surrounding Syria by saying that there are “neighborhoods reduced to rubble by government airstrikes; diabolical Islamic State fighters in black balaclavas; babies