Fame In Jerzy Kosinski's The Painted Bird

Fame can be a double edged sword as the author of The Painted Bird, Jerzy Kosinski, learned. After moving to America after World War Two he used embellished and falsified stories of his time as a child on the Eastern Front to gain intrigue among those surrounding him. When the book The Painted Bird was published, this use of his story stirred controversy over the legitimacy and factualness of the story. The story did not come from nowhere and proved to be a combination of his own exaggerated experiences, his adoptive brothers past and stories that were told among his peers after the war. This brings into question if the novel can still impact others, and if because of its fictional narrative if it can be taken as a legitimate testimony. Despite its …show more content…
Thought the vagueness of Goya’s prints both in settings and in captions such as “They do not want to”, “Nor do these”, and “Or these” he is able to give the impression of a widespread suffering and not pinpoint it on one experience (Goya 9-11). Kosinski’s The Painted Bird also accomplishes this through the vagueness of the setting and never describing where the boy is besides for saying he is on a village in the Eastern Front. The fact that his story is a combination of a multitude of influences mirroring real life events suffered by others, also adds to its vague nature. It is this strength that creates the intrigue of the readers and what causes them to react. Both books, to their credit, prove that a fictional representation of war can indeed be a powerful narrative. This is seen by the ongoing discussion of Goya’s prints and the continuing dialog about The Painted Bird and its relation to events in World War