The+Boy+in+Striped+Pajamas

Sometimes I feel sorry for prepositions in book and movie titles. They always get overlooked when everyone else is getting promoted to capital letters.



**Plot Summary** Bruno is a 9-year-old boy growing up during World War II in Berlin with his loving mother and father.He lives in a huge house with his parents, his twelve-year-old sister Gretel and maid servants called Maria and Larrs. His father is a high-ranking SS officer who, after a visit from Adolf Hitler (referred to in the novel as "The Fury", Bruno's misrecognition of the word "Führer") and Eva Braun, is promoted to 'Commandant', and to Bruno's dismay the family has to move away to a place called Out-With. When Bruno gets there he feels a surge of homesickness. He is unhappy with his new home. Bruno is lonely and has no one to talk to or play with and the house is so small that there is no exploring to be done. However, one day while Bruno is looking out of his window he notices a group of people all wearing the same striped pyjamas and striped hats or bald heads. As he is a curious child, Bruno asks his sister who these people are, but she does not know. His father tells him that these people are not real people at all. They are Jews. Bruno finds out he is not allowed to explore the back of the house or its surroundings, and his mother forbids him to do so. Due to the combination of curiosity and boredom, he decides to explore. He spots a boy on the other side of the fence. Excited that there might be a boy his age, Bruno introduces himself and finds out Jewish boy's name is Shmuel. He was taken from his family (his father came with him, his mother and his siblings are at home) and forced to work in Auschwitz. Almost every day, they meet at the same spot. Soon, they become best friends. Bruno and Shmuel even shared the same birthday. Bruno's mother persuades his father to take them back to Berlin after a year at Auschwitz, while the father stays at Auschwitz. The story ends with Bruno about to go back to Berlin with his mother and sister on the orders of his father. As a final adventure, he agrees to dress in a set of striped pyjamas and go in under the fence to help Shmuel find his father, who went missing in the camp. The boys are unable to find him. Then the boys are mixed up in a group of people going on a march. Neither boy knows where this march will lead. However, they are soon crowded into a gas chamber, which Bruno assumes is a place to keep them dry from the rain until it stops. The author leaves the story with Bruno pondering, yet unafraid, in the dark holding hands with Shmuel. //"...Despite the chaos that followed, Bruno found that he was still holding Shmuel's hand in his own and nothing in the world would have persuaded him to let go"//. In an epilogue, Bruno's family spent several months at their home trying to find Bruno, before his mother and Gretel return to Berlin, only to discover he is not there as they had expected. A year afterwards, his father returns to the spot that the soldiers found Bruno's clothes (the same spot Bruno spent the last year of his life) and, after a brief inspection, discovers that the fence is not properly attached at the base and can form a gap big enough for a boy of Bruno's size to fit through.

=**Characters**=


 * //Bruno - //**Being the protagonist, Bruno is a naïve 8-9 year-old German boy whose father is the commandant of "Out-With" (Auschwitz) Born on April 15, 1934, he wants to become an explorer when an adult. Bruno is very adventurous, often gets into mischief, and hates being called "Little Man" by Lieutenant Kotler. His three-best-friends-for-life are Daniel, Martin, and Karl. Until, at the end of the novel, he forgets his friends names and tells Shmuel that he is his best friend for life.

 **//Shmuel -//** Shmuel is a Polish Jew who is Bruno's exact age. He has a brother named Josef, his father is a watchmaker, and his mother is a teacher. Shmuel is very quiet, and wants to work in a zoo.

 **//Gretel -//** Gretel, known as "The Hopeless Case" to her younger brother Bruno, is a 12 year-old who loves dolls. Her best friends are Hilda, Isobel and Louise. Gretel is a show-off who thinks she knows everything, and is flirty towards Lieutenant Kotler. She also is a member of the Hitler Youth.

 **//Lieutenant Kurt Kotler -//** Despite his father not being a Nazi, Kotler is a harsh Nazi lieutenant who constantly flirts with the commandant's daughter, Gretel. He is very rude and brutal. Later, he is sent to the front lines for not reporting his father to officials.

 **//Ralf (Father) - Elsa (Mother) -//** Ralf is the commandant of the camp. Although a loving father, he is quite a harsh commandant. He is the father of Bruno and Gretel. Elsa is a very good mother, and does not agree with Nazism, although she never speaks out.

 **//Pavel -//** Pavel is a Polish-Jewish doctor-turned-waiter. He's kind hearted and helps bandage Bruno's knee.

 **//Maria -//** Maria is the family's maid. She's very quiet, and she used to admire the commandant until he took the promotion to Auschwitz.
 * Other minor characters **

 **//Grandmother - Grandfather -//**Parents of Ralf. Grandma isn't a Nazi, although Grandfather is.

 **//Lars -//** Lars is the butler.

**An interview with John Boyne (requires QuickTime)**
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Criticism
Rabbi [|Benjamin Blech] described the book as "not just a lie and not just a fairytale, but a profanation". Despite the book's intentions, he argues, the plot is highly improbable and gives credence to the defence that people did not, and could not, know what was happening within the death camps. Students who read it, he warns, may believe the camps "weren't that bad" if a boy could conduct a clandestine friendship with a Jewish captive of the same age, unaware of "the constant presence of death". However, [|Kathryn Hughes], whilst agreeing about the implausibility of the plot, argues that "Bruno's innocence comes to stand for the wilful refusal of all adult Germans to see what was going on under their noses"

Research notes:

=**Activities**= ==