Book Thief Study Guide Pdf

THE BOOK THIEF

Suggesting a Cross-Curricular Arroyo Coordinating ELA and History Classes

SUBJECTS — Earth/Federal republic of germany, WW-II, ELA (theme, personification, symbol, & irony);

SOCIAL-EMOTIONAL LEARNING — Families in Crunch;

MORAL-Upstanding EMPHASIS — Responsibility, Caring.

AGE : xiii+; MPAA Rating — PG-13 for some violence and intense depiction of thematic material;

Drama; 2013, 121 minutes; Color. Available from Amazon.com .

Take STUDENTS READ THE BOOK! The best selling novel on which the movie is based is truly a wonder and is loved by millions, teenage and adult. The flick retains the remarkable homo characters who are the foundation of the story, the setting, and many of the events described in the book. However, no picture tin capture the depth of this novel and much has necessarily been lost in the adaptation of 550 pages of text to a two-hr film.

This Learning Guide contains materials for teaching the novel likewise as the moving-picture show. The more students know about pre-WWII Germany, the Holocaust, the Blitz, and the Allies' devastating response, the more they volition appreciate Markus Zusak'southward worldwide best-seller. Thus, TWM suggests cooperation between ELA and history instructors. Notwithstanding, the Guide also provides the basic historical background that can be used by ELA teachers when there is no opportunity to coordinate with a history teacher.

This Guide includes reports of actual events on which a few episodes in the story are based. These increment the veracity of both the novel and the film.

Carte du jour

MOVIE WORKSHEETS & Student HANDOUTS

DESCRIPTION

The Book Thief is the tale of a immature orphan named Liesel and the people who dearest her in a small High german boondocks but before and during WWII. The story shows that the power of honey overcomes tragedy and hardship. Ready among civilians living in Nazi Federal republic of germany, The Volume Thief demonstrates that even amongst a roughshod and feared enemy there are valuable people of character. The story leads the reader/viewer to a new understanding of the abrupt and indiscriminate death acquired by aerial battery of noncombatant communities.

SELECTED AWARDS & Cast

Selected Awards:

This picture show received several awards nominations for the best musical score.

Featured Actors:

Sophie Nélisse as Liesel Meminger; Geoffrey Rush as Hans Hubermann; Emily Watson as Rosa Hubermann; Nico Liersch as Rudy Steiner; Roger Allam as Narrator / Death (phonation); Heike Makatschn equally Liesel'due south Mother; Kirsten Block as Frau Heinrich.

Director:

Brian Percival.

BENEFITS OF THE MOVIE

When shown later on the volume has been read, the moving-picture show allows teachers to confirm lessons taught using the novel and to demonstrate how a book and its adaptation to moving-picture show tin can exist contained works of fine art. For classes in which reading levels do not permit students to experience the novel, the movie is an fantabulous instance of cinematic literature from which lessons about a grapheme-driven story, plot, irony, and theme tin can be crafted.

Students will gain new understanding of the ability of love and the horrors of war. In ELA classes students volition be exposed to the of import themes set out in the story, be able to analyze a character-driven story, derive its themes, and explore the use of irony. Both novel and movie offer practiced occasions for give-and-take and writing assignments. For history classes the story will provide a bright added dimension to events in Germany earlier and during WWII, especially of the Allies' aerial bombardment of Germany.

POSSIBLE Bug

PARENTING POINTS

Your child should be aware of the history of WWII set out in the Introductory Section of this Learning Guide. Before watching the movie tell him or her that in this story, the narrator is a personification of death. Later watching the film, read the selected quotations from the author well-nigh some of the real events that are reflected in the story.

HELPFUL BACKGROUND

SOME DIFFERENCES Betwixt THE STORY TOLD IN THE NOVEL AND THE STORY TOLD IN THE Motion-picture show

"I meet the volume and flick every bit ii completely different things. Like brothers, they might await the same at times, and sound it. They might even have the same blood in their veins. Simply they go their own ways." Markus Zusak in the Sydney Morning time Herald.

The moving-picture show does not fairly develop and de-emphasizes the graphic symbol of the narrator, Death.
In the novel, Max insists upon sleeping in the basement, subsequently his first sleep of several nights. In the moving picture, it is fear of discovery that sent him downstairs. In the volume, the Hubermanns bring Max support to sleep in Liesel's room because of the cold in the cellar. This does not occur in the flick.
The entire food-stealing subplot is not in the film. The subsidiary characters and the emotional development of the characters of Liesel and Rudy that occur because of the food stealing are absent from the film.
In the movie, Liesel calms the people in the air-raid shelter by telling them a story reminiscent of Max that allows the audience to reflect on Max' situation and her reaction to it. In the novel, she reads from a book, an action which is more in sync with the themes of the importance of reading.
In the novel, Rudy's father is sent to war as a punishment for non permitting Rudy to attend an elite Nazi school. One of the Zusak family unit stories that inspired the book was that Marcus Zusak's gramps was drafted into the German army equally retribution for not allowing his son, Marcus's father, to be sent to a special Nazi school. The novel includes this story, but in the flick, Rudy's begetter is drafted before Rudy is offered the opportunity to go to the school. The only part of this incident that remains in the motion-picture show is the offering to Rudy to attend the school and his family's refusal to allow him to go. In the novel, both Hans and Mr. Steiner are drafted as punishment for not cooperating with the Nazi government.
In the book, Hans tries to give bread to a starving Jewish man and is whipped for his actions. Equally a consequence of this impulsive action, it is not deemed safe for Max to remain hidden in the basement. In the motion picture, the confrontation with the Nazi authorities that sets upward Max leaving the Hubermann'due south home occurs when a man is taken away by the Gestapo which has been examining birth certificates looking for people born Jewish who are still at big in the country. Hans protests that he has known the man all his life, and the Gestapo officer pushes Hans to the basis and takes his proper name. In both novel and motion-picture show, Liesel and Rudy scatter breadstuff for a column of starving Jews. They are chased by a soldier.
The subplots of the hatred between Rosa and Mrs. Holtzapfel, the return dwelling of Half-staff's son, his suicide, and Liesel reading to Mrs. Holtzapfel are not included in the film. Over again, this is of import information relating to the development of Liesel'southward graphic symbol and themes of the volume that were excised from the film, undoubtedly due to fourth dimension constraints.
In the novel, the use of walls in the basement for Liesel to learn to read is haphazard and not organized. In the movie, Hans paints section for words of each letter.
The aspect of Max's character equally a fighter and the origins of his friendship with the man who saved him are not adult in the motion picture.
The adult children of the Hubermanns are not in the picture. Again, this excludes some interesting groundwork and character development that are included in the novel.
In the movie, the circumstances in which the mayor and his wife stopped using Rosa to wash their laundry are inverse, and Liesel doesn't yell at the mayor's wife and insult her.

USING THE MOVIE IN THE CLASSROOM

Before Reading the Book or Watching the Movie:

Coordination of Classes

The history teacher should accept the lead in providing the historical background necessary to fully empathize the story. The topics are set out below. If no history teacher is bachelor to pair with, ELA teachers can provide the essential background from the information prepare out below. This information can also exist provided through student reports.

Groundwork to Assist Students Get the About from the Novel and the Film

Geography

Testify the locations of Germany, Munich, England, and London. Molching, the fictional town in which the picture show is set, is forth a major route to the notorious High german concentration campsite of Dachau.

The First World War

WWI, in which England, France, and Russian federation fought Federal republic of germany, Austria-hungary, and Turkey was one of the deadliest wars in history. The war was at a stalemate until 1917 when the U.S. intervened on behalf of the English and French. Jews fought for their various countries on both sides of the conflict.

The Nazification of German Gild

The Nazi party and Adolf Hitler came to ability in 1933. Over time the Nazis thoroughly dominated Germany with all institutions of order being Nazified or disbanded. All dissenters, such as democrats, socialists, communists, and the religious were ruthlessly suppressed. Books which independent writings that did not adapt to the Nazi credo of Aryan superiority were burned. Paintings and other works of art that the Nazis disliked were destroyed.

Propaganda

The Nazi party used propaganda, including Hitler'southward autobiographical manifesto, Mein Kampf (My Struggle), to acquire and maintain control over German language society.

Hitler Youth and United German Girls

All children were required to vest to the Hitler Youth (for boys) and the United German Girls; the boys were prepared to be soldiers and girls were prepared to be homemakers and mothers. In 1933 Hitler stated that:

My programme for educating youth is hard. Weakness must be hammered away. In my castles of the Teutonic Lodge a youth will grow upwardly earlier which the globe will tremble. I want a brutal, domineering, fearless, cruel youth. Youth must exist all that. It must bear pain. There must be nix weak and gentle almost it. The gratuitous, excellent fauna of prey must again flash from its optics…That is how I volition eradicate thousands of years of human domestication…That is how I will create the New Order.

The Holocaust

In Nazi Germany, Jews, political opponents of the Nazis, socialists, communists, the very religious, the handicapped, and Gypsies were hunted down and placed into concentration camps. The goal of the Nazis was to "purify" Germany of people who were their opponents and of people who didn't conform to the ideal of an Aryan. In improver, non-Jews from Nazi occupied countries, such every bit Poland, Russia, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Ukraine, Holland, and France were killed in the concentration camps. It is estimated that half dozen,000,000 Jews died in the concentration camps and some other five,000,000 not-Jews died there too. In addition, the Germans killed millions in the countries that they conquered without bothering to take them to concentration camps.

The concentration army camp at Dachau, which was close to Munich, held clergy, communists and other political opponents of the Nazis, German language royals and aristocrats, resistance fighters, scientists, writers and, of form, Jews. The weather at Dachau were notoriously brutal. In improver, inmates at Dachau were subject to inhumane medical experiments which oftentimes caused their deaths. Dachau was also a major slave labor center. Other concentration camps, such as Auschwitz, were established for the purpose of simply killing people.

Kristallnacht

Kristallnacht ways, in High german, "the night of crystal." On November 9 – 10, 1938 the Nazis coordinated attacks confronting Jewish synagogues and concern throughout Federal republic of germany, Austria, and German language occupied areas of Czechoslovakia. The name comes from the shards of glass from the broken windows of buildings endemic by Jews. That night Nazi rioters destroyed 267 synagogues and 7500 businesses. Ninety-one people were killed, and there were numerous rapes. The authorities looked on and, in fact, cooperated. xxx,000 immature Jewish men were arrested and incarcerated for no reason. Fire fighters would non douse the flames on Jewish-endemic buildings but only sought to prevent the flames from spreading to structures owned by non-Jews.

Jesse Owens

Hitler had planned to utilise the 1936 Summer Olympics which were held in Berlin to bear witness the superiority of Aryan athletes. Information technology didn't plough out that mode, in large part because of Jesse Owens, an African-American. Owens won four gold medals: in the 100 meter dash, the 200 meter dash, the long jump, and the 4×100 meter relay. He was the most successful athlete at the games. Jesse Owens ran rails for Ohio Country University and held the globe tape in the long jump for 25 years.

German Bombing of England and Centrolineal Bombing of Germany

World State of war 2 saw the offset sustained aerial bombing of cities as a strategy of state of war. In those days, in that location were no precision-guided bombs every bit there are now. Aerial bombing was very inaccurate and many bombs missed their targets. In the summer of 1940, the German Air Force, the Luftwaffe, started bombing armed services and industrial sites in England. In September 1940 the Luftwaffe shifted its tactics and bombed civilian areas of British cities, especially London. The goals were to dethrone British industry and military preparedness and to demoralize the population in preparation for a German language invasion of England. The bombing of noncombatant areas lasted for eight months, until the following May, when Hitler gave up on the idea of invading England and turned his attention to Russia. The British called the bombing campaign "the Blitz." The Rush only stiffened British resolve to fight.

The German bombing of London was intense. During the beginning 57 days of the Blitz, London was bombed day and night. In all, 40,000 – 43,000 civilians in London and other British cities were killed by the Luftwaffe between September 1940 and May 1941. Another approximately 46,000 were injured. 1.4 meg were made homeless. Later in the war, the British and the Americans repaid the favor with aerial bombing that killed more than 300,000 German civilians, destroying entire neighborhoods. Once again, the stated reasons were to degrade war industries, disrupt military preparedness, and demoralize the population. There is no evidence that the air campaign demoralized the German population. While today the indiscriminate killing of civilians from the air would clearly exist considered a state of war offense, no German official was prosecuted for his participation in the Rush. Some historians contend that this was because the U.S. and British air forces had themselves killed and then many civilians from the air.

By the end of the war, the Germans had lost the power to send bombers to England. Yet, they fought back with V-2 rockets, the first guided missiles. The Five-2s killed nigh six thousand British civilians and wounded another seventeen chiliad. Five-2s were more accurate than bombing from airplanes but did not take anything like the accurateness of modernistic prowl missiles which tin can striking a specific building. Casualties would have been much worse except for a British disinformation entrada that convinced the Germans that the V-ii rockets were over-shooting London targets by x to twenty miles. The Germans fell for it and this limited the V-2's effectiveness. After the state of war Germans who worked on the V-two plan, including Wernher von Braun, were recruited by the Allies and the Russians and became leaders of the competing American and Soviet infinite programs. Run into The Right Stuff. They were not prosecuted for war crimes.

Special Note for Classes That Watch the Movie But Don't Read the Volume:

Teachers: The film could have done a improve chore of introducing the narrator. To correct for this, simply tell students that the story has an unusual narrator: i.due east. Death. He starts and ends the film.

After Reading the Novel or Watching the Movie:

The author has stated that the book includes incidents contained in stories told to the author by his parents. Several are set out beneath. The fact that scenes in the novel and the movie relate to real-life events, that the author's father had a friend who was mistreated by the Hitler Youth leaders, and that his female parent lived with foster parents during the war raise the story's veracity. Read or relate the post-obit statements by the writer to the form.

When I was growing up in suburban Sydney, I was told stories of cities on burn down and Jews being marched to concentration camps. Both my parents grew up in Europe during World War Ii, and although they were extremely young at the time, in hindsight, they were able to understand many things. Ii stories my mother told me nearly growing upwards in Munich always stuck with me. One was almost a burning sky when the metropolis was bombed. The other was about a boy being whipped on the street for giving a starving Jewish man a piece of bread. The man sank to his knees and thanked the boy, but the bread was stripped abroad and both the taker of the bread and the giver were punished.

Yous don't really think of sense of humor when y'all retrieve of that time, simply there were a lot of funny stories as well. I knew about my dad "jigging" as we say in Australia the Hitler Youth meetings, considering he had a friend who suffered at the hands of the leaders. And so they merely said, "Nosotros're not going. We're going to go to the river instead and get muddy plenty to fool our parents." Another story I knew was nigh Hitler'southward birthday, and my mother'due south foster father refused to fly the Nazi flag. His wife said to him, "Yous're going to wing the flag or else they're going to come up for united states of america." These are the stories I knew, and I thought, "I oasis't seen that on all the documentaries. I'm going to use these because this hasn't necessarily been done a lot." Interview with Markus Zusak, Author of The Book Thief and I Am the Messenger Female parent/Girl Book Club; Posted on Feb 24, 2010, 3:33 p.m.

The author also stated that "… [M]y dad stopped going to Hitler Youth, the same way Rudy did. He was as well mitt-picked to join a selective school for Nazis and his father was sent to state of war for refusing to manus him over." Ten Questions with Markus Zusak Politics and Prose Bookstore;

Give-and-take QUESTIONS

The following discussion questions relate to theme. click hither for boosted give-and-take questions on theme and for questions regarding some of the literary-cinematic devices found in the novel or the movie, such every bit irony, personification, and symbol.

1. Identify a theme from the story that taught you something or confirmed or expanded your understanding of something that you already knew.

Suggested Response:

Students volition codify the themes in their own mode. The substance is what is important. Students may likewise encounter additional themes in the motion-picture show. The following suggestions are non in order of importance. They may overlap.

A. The enemy population in war includes many good people and it is a tragedy when they dice; thus all noncombatant casualties are a dandy loss and a dandy injustice, every bit are many armed services casualties. (Equally to military casualties, see All Quiet on the Western Front end.)

B. Human nature has a strong element of duality. Equally Death said, "I am always finding humans at their best and worst. I come across their ugly and their beauty, and I wonder how the same thing can be both." p. 491.

C. Beloved is the footing of all that is good and bully in the human grapheme: information technology heals, nurtures and allows the best in others and self to flourish.

D. Love is the strongest and near important emotion, having the power to overcome great loss; in other words, the man spirit is strong and tin can survive many terrible losses through the power of love. [Themes C and D are, of class, related.]

E. Words are extremely powerful because they motivate people to deed and touch on how people run into others.

F. The good in human being nature triumphs over everything, including evil and the inevitability and randomness of death.

G. Meeting your responsibilities (every bit Hans did in hiding Max) is essential for expert moral character and self-respect.

2. Who are the killers in this story? What is the significance of this fact?

Suggested Response:

At that place are two sets. Information technology's the American or British airmen who dropped the bombs that destroyed Heaven Street and killed Hans, Rosa, Rudy, and the others. While the Nazis threatened the inhabitants of Sky Street and in the background were doing their atrocities in the Holocaust, it was the Allies who killed the people who Liesel loved. The significance of this fact is that in an all-out state of war, like WWII, hundreds of thousands civilians are killed, including people like the characters in this story.

3. What does this story tell us about death? (Expiry in this question does not include the graphic symbol of the narrator in this story.)

Suggested Response:

Death, especially death in war, is random and senseless. Students might also note that death is a process (verb) and a result (noun).

4. Some commentators say that the strongest literary element in this story is characterization and that plot is secondary. Describe why they say this and why you hold or disagree.

Suggested Response:

This is clearly a character-driven story. The characterizations are strong. The climax, the Allied bombing of Himmel Street has zippo to do with the deportment of whatever of the characters or the conflicts described in the story. For the characters and the issues they have been dealing with, the resolution comes, as information technology were, out of the blue.

v. Today, the bombing of a street like Himmel Street would probably be considered a state of war law-breaking. Why is that? What is the implication of your answer to the use of atomic weapons?

Suggested Response:

At that place is no i correct answer to this question. Good responses will hash out the advancing civilization of the world, "The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice." (MLK). A good discussion will embrace the following areas. Some would say that information technology depends upon the type of war. Civilian casualties should be very restricted in limited wars, such as the recent wars fought by the U.South. and its allies. A strong response will note the availability of cruise missiles which tin can guide bombs to targets equally small-scale as a specific building. Diminutive bombs are indiscriminate weapons that destroy entire cities. Could diminutive weapons e'er exist used in a express state of war? What if Iran develops a nuclear weapon and bombs Tel Aviv? Would the Israelis or the U.S. be justified in dropping a nuclear bomb on Tehran? What nearly all the fabulous innocent people living in Tehran?

See TWM's unit on Mass Casualties and Making Decisions About War which provides an in-depth analysis of the conclusion to launch a nuclear attack on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Students who take read The Volume Thief or who have seen the movie, might be interested in this unit of measurement.

Boosted discussion questions on some of the literary/cinematic devices relating to the novel or the movie.

half-dozen. A commentator wrote that, "Without e'er denying the essential amorality and randomness of the natural club, The Volume Thief offers united states of america a conceivable, hard-won hope." What is that promise?

Suggested Response:

The hope is that people tin survive terrible circumstances and still have lives filled with love, as Liesel did. All the loving people in the novel embody that hope: Hans, Rosa, Rudy, the Mayor's wife, and especially Liesel. Liesel becomes someone so live and giving that fifty-fifty Death cannot help but dear her and while Expiry may not exist obsessed with them Hans, Rosa, and Rudy are memorable characters that all man readers/moviegoers volition come up to honey. The quote is from Fighting for Their Lives by John Green, New York Times, May 14, 2006

7. Liesel is an beauteous graphic symbol, simply there is something she did in this story that she will regret all her life. What was it and how does it relate to a major theme of the story?

Suggested Response:

Liesel will regret non allowing Rudy to kiss her; in other words, not assuasive Rudy to express how much he loved her. And also not beingness able to tell him how much she loved him. The theme that this relates to is the positive power of love (Item C in the suggested response to question #1 in the Learning Guide). Of course, Liesel's refusal was innocent and totally appropriate for a girl her historic period. It was but in calorie-free of Rudy's unexpected and sudden decease that it could be seen as an mistake.

eight. The post-obit ii questions should be asked together:

A. What is the reason for Liesel's blood brother, Hans, Rosa, and Rudy to dice and for Liesel and Max to alive?

Suggested Response:

There is no reason. Expiry is random.

B. This story suggests how to answer to the random dreadfulness of death. What does it tell united states?

Suggested Response:

The merely way to reply to the random dreadfulness of death is through a commitment to life and with dearest for the living.

nine. In reality, is expiry-haunted by human beings? Why is the personification of expiry, the narrator of this story haunted by humans?

Suggested Response:

Death (the verb) is a process. Death the noun is a result. (p. six). In reality, decease has no feelings. However, as a literary device, equally a narrator, "Death" must care about humans. Otherwise, the story would be flat and tiresome. But near importantly, Death is haunted past human beings because a theme of the book is that despite dreadfulness and inevitability of death, the human spirit triumphs over all; and in fact, as homo beings, we demand to believe that and we should believe it.

10. Several characters in the story suffer from survivor'southward guilt in this story. What is survivor's guilt and how practice the characters deal with it.

Suggested Response:

Survivor's guilt can occur when a person survives a traumatic consequence and others do not. Survivors volition sometimes feel guilty as if they have done something wrong, when, in fact, they were just lucky or smart. Hans suffers from survivor's guilt considering he was the only person in his unit to survive an date. Hans, a man who understands the importance of dearest, takes his guilt and uses it to learn to play the accordion and to help Max. The son of Ms. Hostapfel commits suicide. Max feels guilty that he was happy to be live when he left his family, most of whom undoubtedly were murdered past the Nazis. Nosotros are not actually told how he deals with that just Death comments that he felt it all his life.

11. The novel contains the following passage at folio 65:

Some crunched numbers. — Since 1933, xc percent of Germans showed unflinching support for Adolf Hitler. That leaves ten percentage who didn't. Hans Hubermann belonged to the ten percent.

Consider this passage in relation to the 1 below from a novel called The Magus by John Fowles.

The human race is unimportant. It is the self that must not be betrayed. I suppose one could say that Hitler didn't betray his self. . . . Simply millions of Germans did betray their selves. That was the tragedy. Not that one man had the courage to be evil. Only that millions had not the courage to exist skilful. (The Magus, p. 132)

As a member of a social club, what do these passages mean to y'all? Exercise you think that Hans did enough to resist Hitler?

Suggested Response:

There is evil in every society. These passages tell us that we cannot stand idly past and allow our club to do terrible things. We must do what nosotros can to heighten the practiced and restrain the evil. There is no good response to the question of whether Hans did enough to resist Hitler. A few Germans did resist the Nazis and paid for their actions with their lives. Come across The White Rose.

Personification of the All-Seeing Narrator

12. What was the do good to the story that the narrator was a personification of expiry?

Suggested Response:

In that location are many; here are some examples. Students will probably come with their own. (a) Using Death as a narrator allows the writer/filmmakers and the reader/viewer to look at the lives and deaths of the characters from a vantage bespeak that is something other than only beingness human. Since 1 of the important themes of the story is a commemoration of the human spirit and of the human capacity for love and survival even through horrific circumstances, having Death be in awe of that spirit, haunted past humans as he says in the last words of the book and the film, allows the author to gloat the human condition without appearing overly proud. In addition, the events of the story are and then terrible that Death, as a non-man (a "result" as he says) can discuss them dispassionately, whereas a human observer would not be able to do this. Death'southward lack of human feeling allows the reader/viewer to supply the emotion and in doing so, the reader/viewer can feel the emotion more exquisitely. (b) Having Death as a narrator is also a clear foreshadowing that important characters volition die and allows explicit foreshadowing in the novel and the film. (c) Using Expiry every bit the narrator provides the opportunity for 1 of the chief ironies of the story, i.e., that death, which will eventually conquer all people and deprive them of their humanity, is obsessed with humanity specially by the character and force of a picayune girl. (d) Using Death every bit a narrator immediately elevates the story to 1 that involves important questions of the human condition. (e) Having Death equally the Narrator allows for numerous interesting ideas to exist presented. 2 examples are set out beneath:

One small-scale fact: yous are going to die. Despite every effort, no ane lives forever. Pitiful to exist such a spoiler. My advice is when the time comes, don't panic. It doesn't seem to help.

Information technology's always been the same. The excitement and rush to war. I met so many young men over the years who have idea they were running at their enemy, when the truth was, they were running to me.

xiii. Expiry has different reactions to the souls of the people that it takes in the story. What practise those reactions have in common?

Suggested Response:

Death'south reaction is very human and life-affirming. This is the essence of personification and i of the central ironies of the story.

14. In this story, expiry is personified, that is, it is given man characteristics despite the fact that it is not homo; it's a process (as a verb) or a consequence (as a noun). What is your reaction to that character?

Suggested Response:

There is no ane right answer. Some may say that they feared him. Others may say that he was wise. Some may say that he was contemptuous. Others may refer to his sense of sense of humour. Nonetheless others may say that he was ludicrous.

15. Is the personification of Decease as presented in this story a helpful concept?

Suggested Response:

In that location is no one right respond. A good word will include the idea that information technology is not helpful in life because it doesn't matter to Liesel or to united states of america that decease is haunted by humans. Death is cold, hard and the taking of our humanity. Another expert signal is that it is an overly romantic concept. Others may say that it gives them a sense of comfort fifty-fifty though it is a fantasy. [Teachers can further ask, "Why is that?" The reply is that we are human beings and we are afraid of death. The thought that death takes account of our deportment is role of the idea that the universe takes business relationship of our deportment and that is comforting; since nosotros are all going to die.]

16. Why are Liesel and her wonderful volume spared?

Suggested Response:

Chance, only take chances.

Symbol

17. Identify two symbols in this story.

Suggested Response:

Each of these symbols can be described in dissimilar ways. They include:

- Heaven Street: This is the name of the street on which the major characters live. It is the street where Liesel found love and happiness, where she learned to read, and where she started writing. With all the other problems that Sky Street had, at least it gave her that and that was her source of happiness, i.e., it was heaven.
- Books, Words, Reading: There are a number of ways to describe this. Books and the ability to read are the means to salvation, literally, Liesel is saved considering she went to the basement the night of the bombing to write her memoirs. Liesel is able to calm the people in the bomb shelter past using words: telling them a story or reading from a book. In the novel she does the same for Frau Holtzapfel. Decease, who is haunted past humans, reads Liesel's memoirs many times, i.e., life asserts itself over decease through Liesel'due south book, as Markus Zusak does through his volume. Max is saved by his use of Mein Kampf to divert suspicion when he is traveling. Hans is saved when he is chosen to write some letters rather than go into the battle in which his platoon is decimated. Writing is a bell-atmospheric condition for relationships. When Liesel's female parent doesn't write dorsum, she knows she'southward dead. Liesel's relationship with Frau Hermann, the Mayor's wife, is based on books and information technology is Frau Hermann who gives Liesel a domicile after the bombing. Michael Holtzapfel explains his decision to take his own life in writing. Notwithstanding, books are also the means by which Hitler seduced the High german people, every bit symbolized past the book Mein Kampf. Then, it could exist said that books, words and reading symbolize power for practiced or for evil.
- The Accordion: The accordion represents the best of Hans. It was given to him past Erik Vandenberg, the human being who saved his life. Playing the accordion is a source of joy and comfort for Hans and for Hans' audience. Rosa holds it to her breast and sleeps with information technology when Hans is away. It is a abiding reminder and reaffirmation of his promise to Max' male parent; complying with that promise, at bang-up risk to himself and his family unit, ennobles Hans. I of Max's get-go words to Hans when he shows up at the Hubermann'due south door is, "Exercise you notwithstanding play the accordion?" When Hans returns from armed services duty, somewhat broken after his experiences, information technology is difficult for him to play.
- Bread: In this story, staff of life is the staff of life, its archetypical meaning. However, when the Hans (in the novel) and the children (in the movie) give it to starving Jews it is more than that. Information technology is respect and honor; an acquittance that they are man beings worthy of respect. This is why in the novel the old man kneels before Hans every bit, in the Zusak family story, the onetime man kneeled before the boy who gave him bread.
- The Snow Brawl Fight and the Snowfall Human: These are a symbol for life. We have to do it and in the end information technology all melts away. Hopefully, we'll have a great fourth dimension in the procedure like the Hubermanns, Liesel and Max.
- The Grave Digger's Handbook is the get-go book that Liesel uses to learn to read. Since reading is life for Liesel the name of her outset volume is an ironic symbol for that fact.
- The pages of Hitler's Mein Kampf are whitewashed to become the pages of Liesel's book.

Irony

18. List some instances of situational in the story.

Suggested Response:

Annotation to teachers: This story has ironic elements but the irony is not nigh so pervasive every bit the irony in other stories, such as Cyrano de Bergerac . A not-exhaustive list of ironies is set out below.

- Death being haunted by life, "unremarkably, people are haunted by the fear of decease;"
- Death has typical affectionate homo reactions to each of the people whose souls he gathers; Death, however, is an impersonal procedure which results in the loss of human life and all that is human;
- Max, the Jew, uses a volume of Mein Kampf equally a shield to avoid detections as he travels incognito in Germany;
- Information technology is the pages of Mein Kampf, whitewashed by Max, that are the pages that Liesel uses to write her book;
- Rudy, the blue-eye, blond haired, perfect Aryan blazon is obsessed by Jesse Owens, a black athlete;
- Liesel who starts out not knowing how to read is saved by writing;
- Liesel is non supposed to exist in the basement – she's supposed to be upstairs in bed; only she lives because she'due south in the basement;
- Liesel survives in a basement that was accounted likewise shallow to be an acceptable shelter; Max also survives in that basement but not from an air raid;
- Hans' life was saved when his friend Erik Vandenberg nominated him to stay dorsum from the appointment and write letters for an officer; however, Hans wasn't then good at reading and writing himself (obviously Mr. Vandenberg had more in listen than a proficient person to write messages when he suggested that his friend Hans stay back from the date — one would similar to call up that Mr. Vandenberg knew that Max was a skillful and loving soul who would benefit in the world);
- The Mayor, the leader of the book burners, has a library full of books.
- The beginning of Liesel's salvation is through The Grave Digger's Handbook;
- The proper name of the first book that Liesel reads, the book on which she first learns to read, is The Grave Digger'due south Handbook; since, for Liesel, reading is life, information technology is ironic that the volume that Liesel uses to acquire how to live is called The Grave Digger'southward Handbook.

Other Literary Elements – Miscellaneous Questions [for students reading the book]

nineteen. In the novel, Expiry is obsessed with colour. Why does this make sense?

Suggested Response:

Expiry is the absenteeism of color (bleached bones, entropy, etc.), and the way that a personification of decease that was fascinated with life would react is that it would be attracted to color.

20. Max told Liesel that, "Memory is the scribe of the soul." What figure of speech is this. What was Max trying to get at.

Suggested Response:

This is metaphor, a description enhanced by the comparison of unlike things. It is a beautiful idea. It is hard to say exactly what it means: one possibility is that our souls are fabricated of memories, or that memory is the manner that our souls piece of work.

21. There are many instances of foreshadowing in this book. How does this author use foreshadowing?

Suggested Response:

He uses information technology to keep involvement. The foreshadowing is e'er vague in many respects, and we want to read on to see how it turns out. Foreshadowing occurs on at to the lowest degree the following pages. 30, 33 & 34,55, 71, 80, 127, 128.

22. The vocalization of this story has two interesting aspects. One is that information technology is told from the standpoint of people who were the enemy in WWII, who we bombed, and who we tried to kill. The second is that it is told from the perspective of death. How does this dually foreign point of view add to the story?

Suggested Response:

The first is that it teaches one of the great themes of the story, which is that even among a hated and feared enemy there are people of grapheme. The events of the story are too fraught with emotion to tell it from form Liesel's bespeak of view, or that of Hans, Rosa, or Rudy or any human character. The altitude of decease from human concerns allows the author/filmmakers to tell the story and then let the human reader/audition feel the emotions themselves. Also, having death equally a narrator provides wonderful opportunities for thematic comment, imagery, etc.

Run across Word Questions for Utilise With any Film that is a Work of Fiction .

SOCIAL-EMOTIONAL LEARNING

FAMILIES IN CRISIS

1. Liesel'due south mother was ill and could not accept care of her children. What was the best thing she could do for them? Suggested Response: If at that place were no relatives suitable to place them with, it would be to identify them with foster parents. Encounter page 32, first three paragraphs. Teachers should consider reading this passage to the class.

MORAL-ETHICAL Accent (CHARACTER COUNTS)

RESPONSIBILITY

(Do what you are supposed to exercise; Persevere: keep on trying!; Always exercise your best; Apply cocky-command; Be self-disciplined; Think before you act — consider the consequences; Exist accountable for your choices)

1. What is the key act showing responsibility in this story?

Suggested Response:

It is Hans' deed of hiding Max, even though it put his life and that of his family in danger.

ii. Was it right for Hans to put the lives of his married woman and his foster daughter in danger only to fulfill his responsibleness to Eric Vandenberg'south son?

Suggested Response:

The primal to answering this question is that hiding Max was the right affair to practice for other reasons, such as being caring and resisting injustice.

CARING

(Be kind; Exist compassionate and evidence you care; Express gratitude; Forgive others; Assist people in need)

Numerous questions set out to a higher place and in the Learning Guide relate to the ethical precept of caring.

Encounter also Discussion Questions which Explore Ethical Issues Raised by Any Picture show .

ASSIGNMENTS, PROJECTS & ACTIVITIES

For ELA Classes

Almost of the word questions in this Guide can serve equally a writing prompt. Boosted assignments include:

1. Write a letter of the alphabet from Liesel to the bombardier on the airplane that dropped the bombs that destroyed Himmel Street. In the letter, she should tell him what his bombs did to her community. She should discuss whether she can forgive him. She should discuss the German bombing of noncombatant targets in England.

2. Write a one-paragraph description of the following characters in this motion picture: Liesel, Hans, Rosa, and Rudy.

3. Write an essay comparing The Book Thief with a story that contains both potent characterizations and a resolution deriving from the conflicts faced past the characters (eastward.g. Hamlet) or with a story dominated by plot such as (e.g., Romeo and Juliet).

For Social Studies Classes

4. Research and write a newspaper about the use of aerial bombing from Earth War II to the drones used in modern warfare. Include a department on the ethics of such bombing.

5. Certain incidents that develop Liesel'due south character and requite it more maturity and depth were eliminated from the picture; undoubtedly this was done because of time constraints. Write an essay comparison the development of Liesel's character in the novel and in the motion picture. [Strong essays volition cite the emptying of the food stealing sub-plot, the reading to Mrs. Holtzapfel, and the suicide of Mrs. Half-staff's son. Strong essays will too describe the complications of the relationship between Liesel and the Mayor's married woman that are included in the novel but not the film.]

6. An episode independent in the novel just deleted from the moving-picture show involves Hans' relationship with his son. Find the references to Hans' son in the volume and draw the development of Hans' character that is missing from the film.

vii. Max asks Liesel, "Make the words yours. If your eyes could speak… what would they say? Find a beautiful scene or object, or an ugly ane. Write a paragraph describing what your eyes say nearly it.

viii. After his mother insisted that Max go off with his friend who had false papers for him, Max felt that "awful, airheaded relief . . . that he would live." In the book, the feeling is described in this manner, "the relief struggled inside him similar an obscenity. It was something he didn't want to feel, but nonetheless, he felt it with such gusto it made him want to throw up. How could he? How could he? But he did." Write the letter that Max would send to Liesel in which he described these feelings to her. Part of the letter should refer to the circumstances which caused him to need to write the letter of the alphabet to Liesel.

Come across also Additional Assignments for Use With any Film that is a Work of Fiction and TWM's guide to Lesson Plans Using Film Adaptations of Novels, Short Stories or Plays .

CCSS Anchor STANDARDS

Multimedia:

Ballast Standard #7 for Reading (for both ELA classes and for History/Social Studies, Science, and Technical Classes). (The three Anchor Standards read: "Integrate and evaluate content presented in various media, including visually and quantitatively as well as in words.") CCSS pp. 35 & 60. See also Anchor Standard # 2 for ELA Speaking and Listening, CCSS pg. 48.

Reading:

Anchor Standards #due south 1, 2, 7 and 8 for Reading and related standards (for both ELA classes and for History/Social Studies, Science, and Technical Classes). CCSS pp. 35 & lx.

Writing:

Ballast Standards #s one – 5 and 7- ten for Writing and related standards (for both ELA classes and for History/Social Studies, Science, and Technical Classes). CCSS pp. 41 & 63.

Speaking and Listening:

Anchor Standards #southward 1 – 3 (for ELA classes). CCSS pg. 48.

Not all assignments reach all Ballast Standards. Teachers are encouraged to review the specific standards to brand sure that over the term all standards are met.

BRIDGES TO READING

This is a marvelous book and everyone should read it.

LINKS TO THE Internet

BIBLIOGRAPHY

See Links to the Cyberspace. Nosotros also included some of the concepts and question in the "Questions for Discussion" on pages 3 — of the Readers Guide in the Commencement Knopf trade paperback edition September 2007. Specific Citations:

The 1933 quote from Hitler almost Hitler Youth is establish on many Cyberspace pages such equally Hitler Youth from the History Place accessed October 5, 2014;
Casualty figures for the Blitz are also more often than not accepted and plant and many websites, including, for example, on Wikipedia Article on the Blitz , accessed October v, 2014.
Casualty figures for the German language civilian population are also from several websites including Wikipedia article on Strategic bombing during World War II ;

This Learning Guide was written by James Frieden and was published on October 26, 2014.

All page references without a citation are to pages of the Start Knopf trade paperback edition September 2007.

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