The Second World War witnessed one of the most gruesome and tragic crimes committed against humanity, and the Holocaust, a genocide against the Jews and which occurred at the hands of the Nazis, was among them. In The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas, readers are given a closer look at what may have happened behind those fences, and behind the doors to the chambers where millions of Jews were brought to death.
On the surface, The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas is a story about a kid, Bruno, who is only 9 years old. He came back home one day to see that he, along with his family, are moving away from Berlin, his hometown, because of his father’s job. They move into an isolated house, separated by a fence from a place where there are people wearing striped pajamas; the house is called Out-With. Bruno befriends a kid, Shmuel, who lives on the other side of the fence.
However, it actually tells the story of a kid whose father is a commandant in the Nazi army, and is moved by Hitler, to manage the biggest death camp in Europe at the time, Auschwitz.
Therefore, the novel could actually be seen as an allegory used to represent the Holocaust, and any other conflict where people become separated by social and racial boundaries. This …show more content…
These barriers, once removed, prove that humans are all equal, and are more or less, the same, almost identical. Even in the novel when these barriers are removed, Bruno and Shmuel become “almost like twins”. for instance, Bruno happens to share the same birthday with Shmuel, looks just like Shmuel with his head shaved, and no one notices that Bruno looks different on the other side of the fence when he dresses just like Shmuel. The only differences among them are artificial
On the surface, The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas is a story about a kid, Bruno, who is only 9 years old. He came back home one day to see that he, along with his family, are moving away from Berlin, his hometown, because of his father’s job. They move into an isolated house, separated by a fence from a place where there are people wearing striped pajamas; the house is called Out-With. Bruno befriends a kid, Shmuel, who lives on the other side of the fence.
However, it actually tells the story of a kid whose father is a commandant in the Nazi army, and is moved by Hitler, to manage the biggest death camp in Europe at the time, Auschwitz.
Therefore, the novel could actually be seen as an allegory used to represent the Holocaust, and any other conflict where people become separated by social and racial boundaries. This …show more content…
These barriers, once removed, prove that humans are all equal, and are more or less, the same, almost identical. Even in the novel when these barriers are removed, Bruno and Shmuel become “almost like twins”. for instance, Bruno happens to share the same birthday with Shmuel, looks just like Shmuel with his head shaved, and no one notices that Bruno looks different on the other side of the fence when he dresses just like Shmuel. The only differences among them are artificial