Sarah's Key Dehumanization Quotes

“Hana’s suitcase”, written by Karen Levine, records a painful memory of a Toronto resident, Gorge Brady, to his lost younger sister in the World War II (WWII), Hana Brady. This memory is provoked by an unexpected package from Japan. Which tells him they are exhibiting his sister’s suitcase as well as her drawing photographs in Tokyo Holocaust Center for a purpose of education about the Holocaust to the Japanese children. And they hope to get more information about his sister, Hana Brady’s life. In the continuing communication with the Japanese children, Gorge gives them all the details about Hana’s short life, and what happens to her in the WWII.

In the novel Night, written by Elie Wiesel, the Jewish people are treated unfair and harsh. For instance “we no longer had the rights to frequent restaurants or cafes .” (Wiesel) this quote means that the Jewish people that lived there were not able to go out to eat or visit a cafe if they wanted to without getting into trouble. Jewish people were also told they had to wear a yellow star even if they did not want to they had to it was the law. Page 11 “...every Jew had to wear the yellow star .” (Wiesel). Later on in time Jewish people were taken to concentrations camps outside of Sighet were they were originally residing. When they arrived at the camp , family’s were separated.

You always hear about the events that occurred during WWII in Germany, but you never really hear about the terrible things that happened in France. The essay is based off of the book “Sarah's Key”, this story told about the events that occurred in France during WWII. This essay will first provide historical context about France during WWII. This essay will then provide a brief summary of “Sarah’s Key” by Tatiana de Rosany. Finally, this essay I'll analyze the themes in the book: loss of innocence and human suffering.

The Holocaust was one of the largest genocides in history. An estimated eleven million people were killed- six million of these people being Jewish. Not only were millions murdered, but hundreds of thousands who survived the concentration camps were forever scarred by the dehumanizing events that they saw, committed, and lived through. In the novel “Night” by Elie Wiesel, Wiesel recounts the spine-chillingly horrific events of the Holocaust that affected him first-hand, in an attempt to make the reality of the Holocaust clear and understandable to those who could not believe it. What was arguably one of the worst punishments the victims of the Holocaust faced, was how they were dehumanized within concentration camps. To dehumanize means to steal away the attributes that make one human, be it loyalty, faith, kindness, or even our love for one another and ourselves. The inhumane treatment of the Jews alongside millions of other victims by the Nazi’s was rooted from the systematic dehumanization of these groups. Although the extent of the brutality cannot ever be fully understood by those uninvolved, Wiesel’s terrifying record of his involvement proves how the unlivable conditions in Auschwitz not only typically concluded with death, but on the way stole the Jews’ faith, forced them to turn on one another in an attempt at survival, and even tore apart the previously unbreakable bond between family members.

Sarah's Key, written by Tatiana de Rosnay, is a parallel account of two different characters. The first character is Sarah Starzynski, a ten-year-old Jewish girl who lived in Paris during World War II. The second character is Julia Jarmond, a 45-year-old American journalist currently living in Paris. Julia found that her life connected directly to Sarah's once she decided to move into an apartment in Paris. From examining the novel, Tatiana de Rosnay imposes a successful thesis that avows an account of a Jew during World War II and presents the effects it had on others during and lastingly after the war.

She then contrasts Sarah’s struggles with an aging journalist named Julia. As it turns out, on an assignment to commemorate the sixtieth anniversary of the roundup, Julia discovers that the family that she married into has a connection to Sarah. Through her investigative journalism skills, Julia is able to write about history on personal level revealing hidden truths. The French committed a mass atrocity against their own people and sent the members of the Jewish community off to Auschwitz. Those survivors like Sarah were not only mistreated, but their story

Rachel is a survivor of the Holocaust. She has lost all her family except for grandfather and her younger brother, Yacov. In the concentration camps, the Nazi took advantage of her in the most horrifying way. They beat and branded her. After the war, she was released and smuggled into Palestine. She had hoped to reunited with her grandfather but instead she was put in a home with many other families. The Jews, her own people, shunned her and would go near her. They called her horrible things like tradior and Nazi. They bullied her until she thought she was worthless, unloved, and ugly inside and out. Rachel closed herself off from others. It was through her friends, family, and faith that she finally started to heal. This process was not easy.

The novel Sarah’s key was written by Tatiana De Rosnay. The two sides of the novel took place in Paris, France, Sarah’s side in 1942, and Julia’s in 2008. Tatiana has Sarah and Julia travel to several places in the novel, Sarah goes from Paris, France; to Vel’ d’Hiv stadium; then to the concentration camp Beaune-la-Rolande; where she escaped and ended up at the Dufaure’s in Orleans, France; when she becomes an adult she moves to the United States where she remains until she commits suicide. Julia’s side of the novel takes her from Paris, France; to visiting the Vel’ d’Hiv and all the concentration camps; to Orleans, France to meet with Gaspard Dufaure and Nathalie Dufaure; to then going to New York to vacation with her family; then visiting Sarah’s husband in Roxbury, Connecticut; which sends her to travel back to France to meet with Sarah’s son in Florence; back to Paris, France; where she finally ends up in New York city living with her two daughters in a small sublet.

In Sarah’s key, a young girl named Rachel grew ill after a night at an elderly couple’s home, but even with her rapid decline in health, the officers showed no mercy, as they ripped her from the bed, all while Sarah heard, “Rachel’s thin scream all the way from the top of the house. Rachel torn from the bed by the Germans” (De Rosnay 129). To remove a ten-year-old girl from a bed is because of her beliefs is completely disrespectful and sinister to one’s

Sarah and Julia both encounter turning a blind eye to conflict, even though Julia turns a blind eye to her husband and his actions while Sarah is mesmerized by the people of France choosing to pretend nothing is happening to the Jews. While Julia is waiting to tell Bertrand about expecting another child, Julia ponders about the past. “There was going to be a new baby. Amelie could not fight against that. I smiled, a little bitterly. Closing my eyes. Wasn’t that the typical French attitude, closing your eyes on your husband’s wanderings?” (de Rosnay 102) Julia encounters the realization that she has closed her eye on her husband being unfaithful. Julia reflects on how she could let that happen, how she could let Bertrand manipulate her. Now Julia finds herself in a clinic with the life altering decision of getting another abortion to ultimately please her husband. “I was carrying the baby he did not want. My last chance to be a mother. I kept thinking of what Charla had said: This is your child, too. For years, I had longed to give Bertrand another child. To prove myself. To be that perfect wife the Tezacs approved of… But now I realized I wanted this child for myself. My baby. My last child.” (de Rosnay 167) While trying to live up to the perfect wife in the Tezacs family,

Both books begin with the telling of life before the Second World War and the holocaust. It effectively sets up the devastation of later chapters that paints the gruesome pictures of concentration camps and the horrifying experiences of the German rule. While Women in the Holocaust continuously clarifies that men went through their own hell in camps and beatings from the Nazis, the book underlines the tribulations women suffered from that are strikingly different from the experiences of men, before and after the war. Women in the Holocaust follows various women’s voices to both outline the historical facts and share their memoirs about their survival as Jews. The book begins by introducing the gender structures before the war; women’s role in comparison to men, their status in society, mothers’ responsibilities with taking care of their family and their relationship with their neighbours. The prewar

“Sarah’s Key, the New York Times bestseller by Tatiana De Rosnay, takes place in Paris to discover the dark truth of a Vel d’hiv child that links with a journalist’s research.”(#2) A little jewish girl named Sarah Starzynski was one of the many jewish children that were rounded up in the Vel d’Hiv event. June 16th of 1942, was when the roundup had hit full wave of all the Jewish families, the French police following government orders on that the fateful morning of Vel d’Hiv begun. Causing trauma and fear to the girl, she faced many challenges that were horrible, and tragic that no child should ever be put through. A mother of one and married to a frenchman, at the age of 45, a journalist living in France for over half her lifetime was given

In 1943 Annmarie Johansen and her best friend Ellen Rosen live in Copenhagen, Denmark. Nazi Germany has occupied their country. One day Annemarie, Ellen, and Annemarie’s younger sister Kristi walk home from school. Annemarie and Ellen decide to race but, German soldiers had stoped them on the corner near their apartment building. The Germans question them about a couple of thing so they answer the questions. When Annmarie, Ellen and Kristi arrive home Mrs. Johansen who is Annmaries mom and Mrs. Rosen who is Ellen’s mom are very upset to hear about their daughter’s interacting with the Germans. They warn the girls not to interact with the soldiers.

The book Sarah’s Key, written by Tatiana de Rosnay, begins by introducing the fictional character of Sarah into the real life roundup of Jewish people that occurred at the Vel’ d’Hiv bicycle stadium in France. She then contrasts Sarah’s story of surviving the Holocaust by introducing Julia, an aging journalist. On assignment to commemorate the sixtieth anniversary of the roundup, Julia discovers that the family she married into owns the house were Sarah used to live. Through her investigative journalism skills, Julia is able to write on a personal level to reveal truths left behind in the past. By feeling connected to Sarah on an emotional level instead of just reading words in a forgotten text book. The French committed a mass atrocity against their own people and sent the members of Sarah’s Jewish community (as well as other French Jews) off to their deaths at Auschwitz. Those survivors

A gripping, page turning story of drama, romance, and tragedy, Sarah’s Key is one of the best historical fiction novels to tackle the solemn subject of the Holocaust in France. Told from two alternating perspectives, one of the past and one of the modern day, the novel tells a tale of a young girls’ struggle to survive the concentration camps, and the journalist who discovers her story years later. Based on real historical events, de Rosnay not only entertains readers with her eloquent and thoughtful writing and exciting storytelling, she also enlightens about one of the forgotten cruelties of the French Holocaust. De Rosnay has written an engaging and thought-provoking novel that I just couldn’t put down!