Symbolism In The Book Thief

The Book Thief is a historical fiction novel by Markus Zusak set in Munich, Germany during the Nazi reign from 1936-1943. The novel incorporates a main character that is, in the beginning, an innocent child who doesn't understand the world and takes her on a journey where she grows up and matures through the hardships and challenges of her life. The story is narrated by the character Death, who is a fresh take on the Grim Reaper, only wearing the black cloak when it's cold and never carries a syte. Death describes the life Liesel Meminger, an orphaned girl who witnesses her brother's death and burial and finds herself being adopted by the benevolent old couple, the Hubermanns. The rest of the story follows Liesel's journey through her incredibly challenging life with the Hubermanns and characters such as Rudy, The mayor's wife, and Max helping her along. Symbolism in The Book Thief deepens the story by conveying many different ideas and emotions that supports the reader's understanding of the story. This is especially apparent with the use of the gravediggers to help the reader remember characters, the use of color to help the reader feel the proper emotions and remember the correct events, and the use of Liesel's changing feelings about Rudy to convey how Liesel grows and matures through the book.

Within every human being, through affirmation and recognition by others, one’s worth and value, a sense of belonging is formed. This concept is the main theme within the text, The Book Thief (2005) written by Markus Zusak. The main character, Liesel Meminger, is abandoned by her mother at the age of ten (10) she then spends the next few years finding where she belongs in the world. Throughout the novel Liesel's sense of belonging to the characters Hans Hubermann, Max Vandenburg and Adolf Hitler; the Fuhrer, result in shaping and influence her to view the world differently. This essay will be examining Liesel’s sense of belonging with each of these characters and their effect on her personality, views and ideas.

Death can be thought of as a very violent being and people often associate it with maliciousness. The animated coloring plays to a reader’s familiarity of certain colors and what they represent to create a more vehement image. In the chapter titled “Beside the Railway Line”, Death states that something is blinding white when Liesel’s brother dies. It could possibly be comparing the white snow with the cold of death. There is also repeated mention of the colors of Rudy’s hair and Hans’ eyes. Rudy’s hair is described as being “lemon yellow”. Humanity mostly affiliates the color yellow with happiness, memory, communication, youthfulness and carelessness. But in The Book Thief it is twisted into a grim style. In the novel, Rudy is very happy and he cherishes his youth. When he dies, Liesel remembers the kiss he kept asking for and the mean things she would say to him and it causes great pain for her. Death almost always explains the way a person is when it comes for them. He says that Hans’ silver eyes were open and that Hans’ came peacefully. Silver is often correlated with love and peace. Only because Liesel loved Hans so much, is that why the silver of his eyes are so very important. Death gives a tranquil atmosphere to the violence it concocts. Readers become comfortable with Death the idea of it and frequently miss the gesture of violence.

When writing a book authors like to use colors and symbols to describe and help make the story. In most books color is used a lot in the story to describe things from the sky to people's clothes. The Book Thief use color theory very often. Color Theory says that people will judge a character on the environment and what colors are in the environment(“Color Theory“). We are told the color of the sky when the main narrator Death is doing his job. He does not like his job so he uses colors to distract him from taking people's souls. Death says that he looks at the sky when he is doing his job, "I do try to enjoy every color I see - the whole spectrum. A billion or so flavors, none of them quite the same, and a sky to slowly suck on. It takes the edge off the stress," (Zusak 4). The color of the sky when someone dies had a lot of meaning behind the color. In the Book Thief, the colors are red, blue, black show up in the book the most.

Death also used the colors of the spectrum to describe his job as a “soul gatherer” and the connection with people. Death says “A color will be perched on my shoulder and I will gently carry you away” (Zusak, 4). This explains what Death does when he collects souls. He uses the colors to recollect on events, trauma and his own personal feelings. In discussing the colors, this emphasizes the act of describing the difficult experience of WWII in which returns to the fact that Death is made to resemble a human.

Liesel, the book thief herself, steals books in times of pain. All six books Liesel steals are metaphors for the feelings of loss and pain during the time of which the book was stolen. She uses the books to grow knowledge of the situations occurring around her, one stolen book in particular is “The Gravedigger’s Handbook” This book is the first of all books Liesel steals, and it is the book that caused her to grow to love words, coincidently, she finds this book in the snow on the day of her brother’s death, which is when she was filled with grief and abandonment. This book is a symbol for Liesel’s grief and as she tries to learn how to read the book, her twisted comfort in the story shows how the words had a powerful effect on her grieving process shown by the quotation, “…Not to mention the morbidity of the subject. As for the girl, there was a sudden desire to read it that she didn't even attempt to understand” (Zusak, 66)

Words are everywhere, words make up books, and the power of words make The Book Thief which will never be able to be improved upon. Words help us communicate with others, but mainly they have positive and negative sides to them. In the novel, The Book Thief by Markus Zusak, Death narrates the story while Liesel Meminger also tells her story of living in Nazi, Germany. We will discuss how there are many people such as Max Vandenburg and Liesel Meminger who choose to use to use their power of words in the positive way. We will also discuss how people also like to use their power of words in the negative way such as Adolf Hitler. The power of words are very effective especially in Markus Zusak’s writing, and we’ll discuss the main parts of the book which have been effected with the power of words.

After reading and scrutinizing The Book Thief, one can see that bread, the accordion, and books, the three main symbols used in the novel, are indispensable to the merriment of the book. To add information, these three symbols all represent different things, actions, and people, but can all be compared and contrasted. Three different ways that these emblems can be compared and contrasted is by looking at what they represent, why they represent it, and the reasoning behind why the author used that specific symbol.

Life during the 1940’s was hard for the entire world. As Germany caused suffering and loss in multiple other countries, the people of Germany suffered as well. The Book Thief follows the story of a German girl named Liesel, who was forced to be taken away from her family at a young age. She then becomes the foster daughter of Rosa and Hans Hubermann, whose children have grown up and left. Liesel struggles to understand why her mother had left her, and why Hitler was causing all of the bad things in her life to happen. In The Book Thief, Markus Zusak uses the theme of loss to show how it can bring people closer together.

Finally, the Hubermann’s bond with Ms. Holtzapfel improved through words as well. At the beginning, “it was a tradition for Frau Holtzapfel, one of their neighbors, to spit on the Hubermanns’ door every time she walked past” (Zusak 44), showing that their relationship was pretty rough. However, things started to change after Liesel read the The Whistler in the bomb shelter. Liesel got an offer to read to Ms. Holtzapfel for her coffee ration and the cessation of the door spitting. When the sirens blared, Ms. Hubermann “waddled swiftly through the gate and stood in the open doorway. ‘Holtzapfel!’ …’Holtzapfel, get out here, you miserable old swine!’ Tact had never been Rosa Hubermann’s strong point. ‘If you don’t come out, we’re all going to die here on the

The accordion is taken wherever Hans Hubermann goes, and the fact that he is leaving it to go off to war makes it a more visible symbol. Hubermann is leaving it because one it reminds him of the friend who saved him, and two as a comfort to his wife and adopted daughter. To describe the accordion as a symbol in one word, it would be regret. By Hans going to his second war, he remembers a tragic thing that happened at the first war he fought in. His friend had played the accordion and had volunteered Hans for a job, instead of having him go to the fight they were going to. Because of the friend Hans lived, while everyone who went to fight that day died. The friend had taught Hans to play the accordion, so when it came to taking the accordion

The developmental stage of a young child’s life is very crucial and can be impacted by the media. In The Book Thief by Markus Zusak, Liesel Meminger is a young girl living in a very important part of Germany’s history, the Second World War. Liesel’s childhood unfolds and develops against the backdrop of a time when words, books specifically were used for power and control. Liesel is someone who has a love for reading and, as such, books become very important to her, not only for her education but for her rebellion and discovering her true identity. Throughout the novel, books become a crucial symbol used to convey the desires and discovery of identity for the main character as her childish ignorance changes to her mature adulthood.

Much like waving a white flag, Emma Donoghue’s use of the colour white in “The Tale of the Handkerchief” is symbolic of both surrender, and the refusal to do so for both the Princess and the maid. As the story unfolds and the white items signifying surrender change, so too do the Princess and the maid, and it becomes clear that it is the position, and not the person who occupies it, which determines whether or not surrender is an option. Through imagery such as the Princess’ white horse, and the titular handkerchief, Donoghue makes use of this analogy, both before and after the juxtaposition with the Princess placing her destiny in the hands of others while, the maid is able to exert her own will and dictate what her future will be. From her

As he constantly “expects [humans] to be more or less than they are” (Zusak 4), Death makes a point of noticing the “multitude of shades and intonations” that saturate the sky as he comes to collect the dead; they help him “cope” (Zusak 4) with “the incongruity of what he sees” (Coats 328). In an interview, Zusak remarks that the metaphor of colours used throughout the book is “particularly appropriate” considering that “Death [is] almost breathing colours in to distract himself from all the misery that surrounds him. That in a way [is] a metaphor for the idea that this book is about people doing beautiful things in a really ugly time. And that’s

The book “The Book Thief” had a very good start to it. When I started to read it I was a little confused by the name of it but then I found out what it meant. In the book it had introduced a couple of characters and the characteristics of the book. I realized that most of the celebrations in the book is just stealing books or celebrating Hitler’s birth day but the thing that caught me was the title and wondering what it meant but I realized that what is the point of stealing books is. But I realized what the title was. It’s just talking about how in Germany when world war 1 started people would celebrate when Hitler came back they would steal a book and lite it on fire. My favorite quote is, “You must make sure you use a good shovel. You must