Category / Reading

by Logan Lambert

2.1 written text essay “The Book Thief” by Markus Zusak.

  1. Analyse how language features were used to reinforce or challenge a point of view.

“The Book Thief” by Markus Zusak, is about Death’s view of a little girl living in Nazi Germany during world war 2. Death uses an autobiography that the little girl (Liesel) wrote to describe her life in Nazi Germany, and his own view of what happened based on the memories of everyone involved, and their deaths. This allows us to see Liesel’s life from a unique point of view, a mix of Death’s and Liesel’s. Liesel’s life being: A train ride, a new amazing Papa, a Jewish fistfighter, a lot of fanatics, quite a few books, a bit of thievery, and a lot of death and misery. All of this leads to a book that is great at describing a certain point.

World war 2 was an absolute nightmare. However, from whose point of view can we possibly describe it all? With this novel, we can use the concept of Death to describe the horribleness of World war 2 and in particular, what it means to die.

“As I’ve suggested, my one saving grace is distraction. It keeps me sane.” As this quote suggests, Death requires distraction to save himself mentally. But what could he possibly need to save himself mentally from? Well, lets see. How about every single death of every single human ever. That should be about enough to drive anyone absolutely insane, including the representation of Death in a book who was only supposed to narrate the book to us. And as proof for why Death really does care about all this death, we have this emotive language: “I carried him softly through the broken street, with one salty eye and a heavy, deathly heart.” “He makes me cry.” He was saddened by the death of Rudy, and Rudy’s family. The words ‘broken’; ‘salty’; heavy, deathly heart’; ‘cry’; all prove that he can care about people, and feel something for them that is more powerful than a bit of pity. And so, with this realisation that Death from “The Book Thief” has a human like mind, with human like abilities and emotions; we learn that dying sucks for everyone involved. Seriously, if the very being that represents death doesn’t like seeing people die, then clearly death isn’t a good thing. Death doesn’t like having to watch people suffer or die, and so when he describes other people dying and what the meaning behind certain people dying is later on, remember that Death isn’t to blame for all these people dying. He is just helping to make sure everyone’s souls properly move on.

“Rudy Steiner slept. Mama and Papa slept. Frau Holtzapfel, Frau Diller. Tommy Müller. All sleeping. All dying.” This paragraph is to demonstrate a person’s view on death, by using what Liesel ended up doing after experiencing a lot of death. This is to reinforce the idea that death isn’t normal, while challenging the idea that death is the end of everything.
The quote used to start this paragraph is the line used to break it to the reader about all of those people dying, which is important since this statement completely changed people’s mood. This emotive language got these characters we had been reading about for ages, and killed them all in a single sentence. Which led to most people being rather sad. Liesel never knew her father; her brother died in front of her; every person she knew, like Papa and Mama have backgrounds that include death; Max’s very life is constantly at stake since everyone is against him being a Jew; and then pretty much everyone died while they slept. So after all of that, what would Liesel think about death? I personally think that she would never forget them, however, she will still move on. Why? Because Liesel isn’t mentally weak enough to stop living from that. I mean, she is young, so it did serverally damage her ability to trust others, and make friends(She became like that from her brother and mother leaving, so it will become even worse after the people who saved her leave as well, besides the serious depression). But she still isn’t going to die; she will ‘move on’, and live her life. There is evidence she did that from the quote “There was no recovery from what had happened. That would take decades. It would take a long life.” This quote demonstrates how the only way to save her mind is to live a long life, and let all of the new experiences, and all of that time, to heal over the damage caused during her childhood. Liesel reacted to death by grieving over it, but she still lived a life. So sure, add enough enough death, then a person’s life will become extremely damaged. But, it is still possible to survive afterwards. This proves that death is really effective and not something to be ignored, but it also proves that even after so much death, life continues.

So far we have learnt that Death isn’t to blame for everyone dying, as he is just there at the time for another reason entirely, in fact we should probably be more concerned about his mental health. And that Liesel as a person can survive even if everyone around her dies, proving it is possible for people to do something like that. Now, the final question: What does it mean to die? My own belief(A part of it, anyway), is that if something dies, that is the end of its existence on this world. Everything it did has been in affect, and there is nothing left it can do. In its life, it will of caused the death of many other lifeforms in an attempt to survive for their life. So when you die, it signifies the end of a life that has caused the death of many others, and this is for every life form on this planet. Basically, I believe dying sucks, and every single death matters since every single life form has caused quite a lot of stuff to happen to other lifeforms. Now then, what does this have to do with “The Book Thief”? Well, it is the fact that Death at least recognises how when people die, every one of their deaths matters, and when people kill other people, it really sucks to watch it happen. It leads to this kind of thought: “I am haunted by humans.” Which just goes to show how messed up humanity is, if the representation of death is scared by how humans treat each other. Every life matters, and some evidence of how this is how Death has developed a fear towards humans dying, which shows just how effective and important people are, and a bit on how stuffed up humanity is.

“The Book Thief” by Markus Zusak, was an amazing book, that can get pretty much anyone to cry. From beginning to end, we get to see plenty of death and misery. There are a few things that are nice and happy, but in general, the fact that the book is rather depressing can’t be forgotten. There is so much to learn and realize within this book, that it is honestly quite amazing. So far I have only analysed what Death thinks of death; whether a person can handle having everyone they care about repeatedly die; and then what it actually means to die. But there is so much more to this book than just that. For instance, what do the colours in the book mean, or the effect of words, or even just a simple, why does Rudy matter in the book. The point of what I writ today was to get you to realize how much dying sucks; it isn’t just a number, but a complete and utter destruction of a huge amount of work and effort. And so, from all of this, I hope you all have a new view on what it means to die, and to have other people around you die.

by Logan Lambert

Reading response “Suicide in the Trenches” by Siegfried Sassoon

Poem title: Suicide in the trenches

Siegfried Sassoon, in the poem “Suicide in the trenches” describes the death of a soldier who killed himself. He first describes the situation he is in(“In winter trenches, cowed and glum,  With crumps and lice and lack of rum,”) , then how he died(“He put a bullet through his brain.”) , before proceeding onto a message for the reader(“You smug-faced crowds with kindling eye Who cheer when soldier lads march by, Sneak home and pray you’ll never know The hell where youth and laughter go.”)

This message is simple enough: War caused at least one person to get to the point where they saw no reason to live anymore. No one should ever have to face that kind of existence, and yet, instead of trying to help these people,  the people are merely cheering them on. So of course, this poem is trying to convince people that not going to war would be best, or your life will soon having no meaning, and so be in hell.

This poem taught me that there are many different kinds of people out there. Some who don’t want to live, and so kill themselves. And those who watch on, knowing what happened, but not wanting to discuss it. And with this I realised: There are many different situations out there that people could end up in, but in general, people are always similar; there is always going to be that one person who doesn’t want to live on, but tries to find a reason. But if a war happens, well, what reason could there be? From this lesson I realised that I really don’t want to go to war, for the very fact that I am probably that one person.

The reason for this is that I can understand at least a bit of the mindset that ‘soldier boy’ has. That is, the ideas of “Who grinned at life in empty joy, Slept soundly through the lonesome dark, And whistled early with the lark.” And I guess that the war was just a final tipping point for the person. I mean, how are you supposed to keep yourself alive when you struggle to enjoy and find meaning in life; Particularly when a war is going on around you. The tipping point I am talking about is that the war caused him to lose all reason for continued existence. He was quite possibly already close to this point before the war, for instance that there where only about one or two reasons for life, and that war closed them off from him. Perhaps they where family and friends. Or maybe it was a belief that the future will be a good one. It could even be he actually enjoyed life normally, and had something to do in it he found enjoyable. Maybe even a few things that he finds fun to do. But in any case, a war like the second world war would never allow something like those things to continue on existing. No family; no future but an endless war; nothing that could be fun. What reason could there possibly be when that sort of mindset is used. That mindset which would convince others that everything is fine; even themselves; by grinning without reason; always being alone, and then looking at the morning like you might as well do something with it. That is most likely the mindset this kid has, and I can definitely understand it since I have it.

Really, I’m just lucky that I’m not in a war, and still have some reasons to exist. But that doesn’t change my mindset at all. For instance: I don’t really enjoy life at all, instead, most of the time I just pretend to. I mean sure, there’s happiness, but never for long. And excitement, that’s something I remember feeling thrice in living memory(I lied all the other times I said I was excited). Then there is loneliness. I have one friend, A great friend, sure, but still only one. Oh, and family? My views on my family is that they are all more amazing than me, by one really large degree. How could I not be lonely around them, when I view myself as the only loser amongst winners. And the morning; great time, really. I do enjoy the morning, more than any other time of day(besides when waking up, sleeping is better), as the air is cold, the sun is just shining, and there is only bird chatter. Unfortunately, I don’t really do much at all, so the morning means nothing else but a good atmosphere to me compared to the rest of the day.

Then what about things I enjoy? What reason do I have to live? Well, I love my family, and would do nearly anything for them. I don’t want to lose any friends, and being with them makes me happy. I also believe that a good future for myself is possible, although improbable. Then there are the things I enjoy: there are books(Love those, they let me feel emotions normally! Well, for a few minutes anyway), Food(Tasty, with a hint of satisfaction that my stomach is full), and walking(Who doesn’t like some exercise in their life!). So yeah, there are reasons for my life and continued existence.

Simply put: That kid and myself have similar thoughts about our reasons to live. He just had said reasons taken away from him by the war, which is why I’m lucky. I still have some reasons, and no one is taking them away from me.

This poem also got me thinking about the state the human species is always in. That is, there are always those few people who are getting quite close to death, because they keep on running out of reasons to live. And as the reason “Live because that is the purpose of existence”, well, that just doesn’t cut it. As there are going to be many people out there who think like this, doesn’t that mean that a large portion of humanity is under threat? And if a few of these people die, no one will talk about it, like the people in the poem “No one spoke of him again.” But what if the world goes into another war? How can these people live on when the war takes away a person’s reason to live? Doesn’t this mean that a large portion of humanity will die, leaving the world in a really bad state?

The poem “Suicide in the trenches”, by Siegfried Sassoon, describes the suicide of one person.  And what I did after that was analyze and explain some of the many thoughts and reasons for this poem, and what it means for the world. I went into some depth of a possible state of mind of the person who died, and linked it to myself. And then I talked about how this state of mind could affect the world. Then I stated some questions to make all you readers think a bit more into the situation this world is in. The conclusion we reached was that humanity is in a pretty bad state, as people continue to lose reasons to stay alive. But as long as we don’t enter into another world war, it shouldn’t be too bad. 

by Logan Lambert

2.4 Wilfred Owen poem essay.

The poems “Dulce Et Decorum Est” and “Exposure”, which where written by Wilfred Owen, used different language techniques that helped the reader to understand what the poems meaning was. Every paragraph will have its own theme, which is because every quote and language technique is different and represents a different theme. However, the general theme will be that war is pointless, and that there are many different aspects as to why war is both terrible and pointless.

In the poem “Exposure”, by Wilfred Owen, there are many different sentences where personification is used. This will be analyzed about how personification was used by the use of quotes. Here are a few of them: “For hours the innocent mice rejoice:the house is theirs;”, “Dawn massing in the east her melancholy army.” The reason these were added was because it makes it feel like everything that surrounds the soldiers have their own lives; their own power. By doing this, it makes it seem like their surroundings are human, easily capable of being the enemies of the soldiers. Like when the mice are referred to being in control of the house, which is generally how humans are viewed. Yet it is used to describe mice being in control, saying the same as if these mice are above the soldiers.The weather in this case was one of the other enemies of the soldiers, which is referred to in the second quote, particularly when the incoming clouds are described as an army. Then there is the fact that every single other sentence described how the weather killed the soldiers, for instance “Our brains ache, in the merciless iced east winds that knive us . . . “. This quote is one of the ones that describe how the weather kills the soldiers, and so yes, the weather is another enemy of the soldiers. The poem also talks about the soldiers as ghosts being forced home “Slowly our ghosts drag home:”, they aren’t even referred to as human, which puts humans even lower on the scale of reality. This affects the readers understanding by changing who they view as the true people in the poem, as well as changing who the reader thinks to be the enemy of the soldiers.  This personally affected me in the way that I started to wonder about just what is the most dangerous thing in war. Is it the enemy soldiers, constantly shooting at you, and trying to kill you, or is it the weather and environment around you, that are the true enemy? This poem got me to wonder about that, causing me to come to the conclusion: No one can ignore the weather and environment around you, it is a powerful enemy.

In the poem “Exposure” by Wilfred Owen, there is some listing. Some of this is in the next quote. “But nothing happens.” This sentence is used many times throughout the poem, which drives home the point the sentence is trying to make. In this case, the sentence is trying to drive home how “nothing happens” in the war. It makes sure the reader knows how the soldiers are just sitting there. Sometimes they die from the enemy. Sometimes they die from the weather. And yet, “nothing happens” in the way that the soldiers themselves are doing the same thing everyday; nothing new ever happens. That is, they are sitting in their trenches; attacking the enemy soldiers; watching their friends die from both the bullets and the weather, and just wondering why they are there. This affected my personal understanding by changing the way I think about the war. It is similar to some people lives today. Everyone knows of those people who do the exact same things everyday, just living out there lives without even a hint of reason as to why they do so. It generally leads to depression, and then potentially even suicide as a way to escape the boredom and sadness they feel. The only difference in war is that there is a bit of bad weather and there are bullets constantly whizzing by causing them to die by other means. This ended up changing my view of war from one of protecting other people from the enemy who is invading your country to one of war being pointless, and only leading to death no matter what is done.

In the poem “Dulce Et Decorum Est”, written by Wilfred Owen, repetition is used a few times. Here are some quotes where this is displayed: “All went lame; all blind” With this one sentence, the reader understands that the soldiers ability to move and process what is happening around them is practically gone. Without this, the reader wouldn’t of understood just how bad the situation the soldiers were in when the gas bombs dropped, and might of gotten confused at the point of saying “An ecstasy of fumbling,” as it could’ve also had a happy feeling to it. Another thing is by using repetition here, it creates a more powerful effect, making sure the reader knows that the soldiers bodys are failing. By doing this, the reader will know that the war has been tough against them, and that it has ruined their bodys. It affected my personal understanding of the poem by making sure I knew just how bad it was for them, and how terrible war can be for both the people who survive and for the people who die. The people who die, die an excruciating death. And the people who survive have to live with both physical and mental traumers for the rest of their life. This point also happens in the poem “Exposure”, when “Tonight, this frost will fasten on this mud and us, Shrivelling many hands, and puckering foreheads crisp. The burying-party, picks and shovels in shaking grasp, Pause over half-known faces. All their eyes are ice,” which describes how both the people who died, and the people who survived, are in terrible conditions. They barely even know who they are burying, and all the while they bury them, they are slowly dying. This truly showcases how terrible war is, and how sad it is that these soldiers went to it and died; only to be barely recognisable by their fellow soldiers.

In the poem “Dulce Et Decorum Est”, by Wilfred Owen, emotive language is used many times. This is an analyzation of some of the quotes showing emotive language: “His hanging face, like a devil’s sick of sin;” By using this in the poem, the author can help describe just how nasty the gas is. It affects the readers in the way of telling them that this soldier, fighting for you and your country, is looking about as good as a pile of sick. So it will create large amounts of the feeling horror in the reader. Without it, there is still plenty of emotive language to describe the situation, but each sentence builds up on another to describe an image of how bad the soldier is looking. Because of this building up of horror of how bad the situation is for the soldier, it will better affect the reader than if only one or two sentences where said(In which case there would be no build-up, and the reader will only feel a slight disgust). This personally affected me in the way that I now better understand just how horrible being on the receiving end of a gas attack is. It also got me to better understand that war is a really terrible thing; every part of the poem had something to do with the suffering or worry caused by war. This means that no matter who the reader is, if they read this poem, they will understand at least a little of how terrible war is. Wilfred Owen’s other war poems also had a similar idea. That is, they would explain a view or time he had personally experienced in war. Which led to every war poem he made explaining how horrible war is, and convincing many people that it is a terrible thing.

The poems that were talked about were “Exposure” and “Dulce Et Decorum Est” by Wilfred Owen. 4 language techniques where discussed: Personification, listing, repetition and emotive language. Themes presented are: There are more than one enemy on the battlefield, you have to watch out for the environment too; In life, there will be points were everything feels meaningless, were “nothing happens”, war is no exception; War is horrible, it leaves everyone who survives grieving in pain, and everyone who died, had died a horrible, quite possibly pointless, death; War causes many to die, and it is rarely as simple as just being shot in the head, instead many will go through many different tortures, trying their hardest to survive, only to end up dying at the hands of a gas attack that no one noticed coming. From this, it is obvious there is plenty to learn from these poems. Each one will have affected the reader in powerful ways, so that it would be difficult not to realize something from it. For myself, every theme I just writ where some of the lessons I learnt that I could more easily describe. But in general, I learnt that war is a terrible and potentially pointless thing. Or at least, it isn’t worth the massive amount of sacrifices given to it.

 

by Logan Lambert

The next book I shall read for English.

The last book I read was “Mortal Fire”. A great book, and one that suited this topic.

The next book I shall read will be: “Fahrenheit 451” by Rad Bury. The reason being is that I have wanted to read the book for a while, and so will do so for this class so that I am motivated to understand it properly.

I f anyone disagrees with this choice for some reason, just say so in the comments. Thank you.