Throughout the 1930’s into the 1940’s, the National Socialist German Workers' Party, more commonly known as the Nazis, ruled Germany under a totalitarian dictatorship. Almost all aspects of life in the country were controlled by the government. Under the control of Adolf Hitler, many innocent lives were lost, and the Germans living there were oblivious to the fact. In order to manipulate the country into his puppets, Hitler utilized many racist and immoral techniques to reign Germany. These methods include exploiting the weakness of the government, propaganda, and false promises. The Book Thief by Markus Zusak is a novel that illustrates such behaviors, using the perspective of death to tell the story of a girl named Liesel and the hardships, …show more content…
The Hitler Youth Program was used as a way to brainwash the youth into believing that Nazi Germany was better off without the Jews. Hitler Youth was a Nazi organization that consisted of young boys and girls. German boys and girls, ages 10-17, were forced to join by law. In The Book Thief, Liesel is required to join Hitler Youth as she turns 10, “...Liesel tried on her new uniform. Ten years old meant Hitler Youth. Hitler Youth meant a small brown uniform. Being female, Liesel was enrolled into what was called the BDM” (Zusak 40). Similarly, in Hitler Youth: Growing Up in Hitler’s Shadow, “she wanted to join the girls’ branch of the Hitler Youth, called the Bund Deutscher Mädel (BDM), or League of German Girls” (Bartoletti 19). The Book Thief and Hitler Youth: Growing Up in Hitler’s Shadow describe the BDM, or Bund Deutscher Mädel. Both books use the example of German girls who joined the Hitler Youth, describing their journey in the BDM. The Book Thief integrates this aspect of Hitler Youth, down to the name, as well the age requirement. Additionally, Hitler Youth groups joined assemblies and bonfires. For example,
"The Book Thief" by Markus Zusak is a novel set during World War II, which is narrated by Death and centered around a girl named Liesel Meminger. Throughout the novel, Zusak explores various themes, however we will only focus on one, which is the power of words and storytelling. The story takes place in Nazi Germany, where Liesel discovers the power of words as she learns to read and steals books to escape the harsh reality around her. Mark Zusak rather effectively develops the theme of the power of words and storytelling by showcasing their ability to give individuals a sense of freedom in the face of adversity. Zusak depicts the negative nature of words through the Nazi propaganda that is constant in Liesel's world.
**Introduction:** In the film "The Book Thief," books take on a significant role, symbolizing struggle, change, and hope in the context of Nazi Germany. Amidst the oppressive regime that banned and burned books, the protagonist Liesel Meminger's journey with books reflects the challenges of maintaining humanity, the transformative power of literature, and the solace and inspiration found within their pages. * *Body Paragraph 1 - Struggle:**
Hitler boy youth This research paper is about hitler youth. Hitler trained kids to fight in the war, and he taught them how to shoot different type of guns. Flak gun crew in august 1940, british air raids began against berlin in relation for the bombing in london. Hitler youth boys had already been functioning an outbreak of war.
The article "Hitler Youth: Growing up in Hitler's Shadow" by Laura smith focuses on a girl by the name of Sophie Scholl. Sophie deals with the hardships of contemplating whether or not to follow the Nazis or rebel and try to get her point across about why Hitler is in the wrong. This article also gets into depth on how schools were run and how some of the teachers were dealt with if they rebelled against Hitler. This had all happened because of a group similar to the boy scouts called "Hitler's youth". Hitler's youth focused on making young men into soldiers and making young women into good wives.
The boys branch was simply known as Hitler Youth, and the girls branch was known as the League of German Girls. Girls were training for their future lives as mothers and wives, and boys training to be enrolled into the military. In the last hopeless months of the war, the boys in their early teens were sent to serve in the Germans Civil Defence and in the defensive militia (Volkssturm). In 1939, over eighty two percent of minors from the ages of ten to eighteen, were enrolled in the German League of Girls and Hitler Youth. Throughout both of the programs, the Nazis were filling the young Germans with Nazi ideology.
The book, “The Book Thief” by Markus Zusak, is set in Nazi Germany during World War 2. The Book Thief is narrated by Death, who tells the story of Liesel Meminger, a 9-year-old girl taken in by a foster family after her Communist parents are killed. Liesel steals books from Nazi book burnings, hides them under her bed, and eventually learns to read and write with the help of her foster father hans. Since the book is set during WW2, the book shows many ways why war is tragic. It destroys people and towns and puts fear into the air.
These people created a system that made “expressions of Hitler’s ideology, where the children represented the reserve manpower that would ensure the continued existence of the ‘Thousand Year Reich,’” (“Hitler Youth”). This group molded children into hateful and cruel people that firmly believed in Hitler’s ideology and acted as a backup military. This is especially true because “when they grew up, they became agents of the ‘Final Solution’ - murderers by conviction,” (“Hitler Youth”). The Hitler Youth trained kids from a very young age to be killing machines.
Some children were damaged by the group’s strict leadership and felt as if they had lost all their personality. Although, there were children that were very damaged by the group, others enjoyed that they were all to act as a single group and not have a sense of individuality. The Hitler Youth organization did not promote any kind of distinctiveness amongst the children, they were grooming them into soldiers, sadly most parents couldn’t have anticipated the effect it would have. However, at first the group wasn’t as bad, it offered children a place to come together and play games to improve their strength. But, as time grew on, the group became less fun and more catered towards hard backbreaking work for the kids.
There was marching in parades with bands. Summer camps that prepared boys for camping out doors. They would also have been taught how to map-read and clean and look after a rifle. Fitness and cross-country running would have been high on the agenda. In between these activities their leisure time was devoted to reading and learning about Hitler and the Nazis.
The Holocaust, children around the age of ten, recruited to be a part of the Hitler Youth. Boys and girls were coerced to serve their county and become a Hitler Youth. “In this organization, the Nazi commanders, trained boys to be great warrior and girls to become great mothers and obedient wives ( Schmittroth 375). The leaders pushed the idea that Jews, Gypsies, and Slavic’s were an inferior race and that the Germans were above all other races. German children in the Hitler Youth preformed unbelievable acts of violence to other children and adults.
The Book Thief is the tale of Liesel Meminger, who is a young girl with a love for books. However, the story is set during 1939 in Nazi Germany and Liesel has to survive by stealing. Perhaps the strangest twist of all is that the story is not told from the perspective of Liesel as she learns to read and as well as share the books that she steals with others, but is instead narrated by Death himself. It is an unexpected viewpoint and also one that is not as morbid as one might expect. 5.
Hitler’s Youth then fought in wars. “In 1945 American soldiers reported fighting against entire units of Germans comprised of soldiers twelve years old and younger” (“A Teacher’s Guide” 4). Once the children were part of Hitler’s Youth, they frequently fought until their
The social cultural life on the Nazi Sate 1933-1939 had a significant effect on the youth and women within society. It is due to these factors that Germany began to implement legislations in order to allow Germany to become a powerful country. Toward Hitler and the Nazi Party, young people were incredibly important as they could be easily indoctrinated (brainwashed) and as they could result in the next generation of dedicated Nazis. Women, on the other hand were encouraged to get married and have children. This is because, Hitler needed more women to produce in order to be able to expand his army and gain more soldiers and more girls to be the ‘homemaker’.
Summary of The Book Thief : Liesel Meminger is a young German girl growing up during WWII. She lives with her foster parents, Hans and Rosa Hubermann, outside of Munich, Germany and learns to cope with the loss of a brother and the dreadful nightmares through reading. Reading fills the void her dead brother and her mother left. Books weren't very accepted by society during the war so Liesel stole from the mayor's wife library giving her the name “Book Thief”. Hans is hiding Max, a young Jewish man whose father saved Hans’ life in WWI, in the basement.
And they will never be free again, not in their whole lives.’ (Max von der Grün, Howl Like the Wolves, 1980, pg 118–19.). Hitler wanted to hammer away all the weakness of the youth to create a brutal, domineering, fearless, cruel beast of prey that was the new German youth. This, Adolf Hitler said, is how he would create the New Order (The History Place, 1999-2023). Although it was compulsory for the youth to join these groups, many of them actually wanted to join and were excited to.