Mark Reads ‘The Book Thief’: Chapters 53-54

In the fifty-third and fifty-fourth chapters of The Book Thief, Zusak spends time showing us just how happy Liesel Meminger and Rudy Steiner can be in the great war, ostensibly because he’s about to rip it all away any second now. You bastard. If you’re intrigued, then it’s time for Mark to keep reading The Book Thief.

It’s weirding me out that we’re so close to the end. What, less than two hundred pages now? And after these two chapters, we’re rapidly approaching being three-quarters through the novel, and that much closer to Rudy’s bombing and the time Hans escapes death in 1943. I have to say, I really do not find all the internal spoiling irritating anymore. It’s just accented the book in this really unique way, because now I need to know how all of this comes about.

Damn you, Markus Zusak.

PART SEVEN

the complete duden dictionary and thesaurus

featuring:

way too much joy for the oncoming storm

CH. 53: CHAMPAGNE AND ACCORDIONS

In the summer of 1942, the town of Molching was preparing for the inevitable. There were still people who refused to believe that this small town on Munich’s outskirts could be a target, but the majority of the population was well aware that it was not a question of if, but when. Shelters were more clearly marked, windows were in the process of being blackened for the nights, and everyone knew where the closest basement or cellar was.

I actually didn’t know this was something people did to prepare for potential bombings, the whole blackening of windows. So I was pleasantly surprised to read that because of this, Hans suddenly has work. A lot of work. More than ever. It’s because of this that Liesel is able to spend more time with her papa by accompanying him on some of these work days.

They carted his paint through the town, smelling the hunger on some of the streets and shaking their heads at the wealth on others. Many times, on the way home, women with nothing but kids and poverty would come running out and plead with him to paint their blinds.

“Frau Hallah, I’m sorry, I have no black paint left,” he would say, but a little farther down the road, he would always break. There was tall man and long street. “Tomorrow,” he’d promise, “first thing,” and when the next morning dawned, there he was, painting those blinds for nothing, or for a cookie or a warm cup of tea.

Oh, Hans. He’s been painted as a figure of compassion and love, and it’s great to seem him be able to spread that about town, sometimes taking half a cigarette as payment, doing what he can to help out others. It’s also interesting to see how his behavior and attitude clashes so much with Rosa, yet she’s just as caring and loving as he is, just in a completely different way.

Here in chapter fifty-three is the first time Death decides to share with us Liesel’s eventual writing, that autobiography that’s only been hinted at. (I shouldn’t define it as an autobiography, as it might just be a diary. Or a collection of stories. Or whatever.)

That summer was a new beginning, a new end.
When I look back, I remember my slippery
hands of paint and the sound of Papa’s feet
on Munich Street, and I know that a small
piece of the summer of 1942 belonged to only
one man. Who else would do some painting for
the price of half a cigarette? That was Papa,
that was typical, and I loved him.

I almost wanted to say LOL SHE WRITES LIKE MARKUS ZUSAK, but still…I WOULD LIKE TO SEE A BIT MORE, DEATH. Oh god, we’re not going to, are we? DRAT. I bet we aren’t.

Most of what takes up chapter fifty-three is the ongoing growth between Hans and Liesel. Getting to work with him means a few things for Liesel beyond the obvious fact that they get to spend a lot of time together. Hans is an affectionate father, and he’s always been very physical with Liesel, and these moments while painting are still full of love and yet they all seem so whimsical and silly. (In a good way.)

On other occasions, when she was daydreaming, Papa would dab her lightly with his brush, right between the eyes. If he misjudged and there was too much on it, a small path of paint would dribble down the side of her nose. She would laugh and try to return the favor, but Hans Hubermann was a hard man to catch out at work. It was there that he was most alive.

And that last point is the other half of what Liesel gets to experience that she hasn’t really seen before. From his accordion playing, to his general demeanor, to the way he speaks with his customers, Liesel gets to watch him doing exactly what it is that he loves. Even that is a new adventure to her, as she learns that her father is really good at what he does:

Like most people, she assumed her papa simply took his cart to the paint shop or hardware store and asked for the right color and away he went. She didn’t realize that most of the paint was in lumps, in the shape of a brick. It was then rolled out with an empty champagne bottle. (Champagne bottles, Hans explained, were ideal for the job, as their glass was slightly thicker than that of an ordinary bottle of wine.) Once that was completed, there was the addition of water, whiting, and glue, not to mention the complexities of matching the right color.

The science of Papa’s trade brought him an even greater level of respect. It was well and good to share bread and music, but it was nice for Liesel to know that he was also more than capable in his occupation. Competence was attractive.

I can vaguely remember a few mental images of the first time I visited my own dad at work. This was in Idaho when my dad was working for Micron, but all I can seem to remember are small offices, a few of them in a row, with serene and sterile colors, greys and whites and dark blues, and looking out a rain-covered window and seeing the freeway buzzing by below, thick clouds creeping past the other tall buildings of steel and concrete.

When we moved to Southern California, it was a few years before my dad opened his own business in downtown Riverside, and I remember some of the restless Saturdays I would spend there, completely unable to understand what on earth my dad did. I know it had to do with microprocessors, but that’s all I think I’d be able to tell you these days. I just remember the office, with the smelly lobby that had one of those Arrowhead five gallon dispensers and the water from the red knob never seemed to get hot enough for tea. There was a long hallway that was sometimes poorly lit if the fluorescent lights didn’t come on, but the back warehouse was my favorite. I thought it was impossible to touch the ceiling in those days, and I know my brother and I used to race rolling office chairs or try to ride them like skateboards, sometimes getting adventurous and trying to explore the sections of the building we weren’t allowed to come, sometimes doing so through the virtue of a lengthy game of hide-and-seek.

This bit of The Book Thief reminded me of those days, before the business tanked and my family slipped into poverty, and it reminded me that that was the closest I would ever come to my father, even in later years when we didn’t clash and he was excited about what I was doing in life. My father gravitated towards my twin more than I, and sometimes I think it’s because my father was so traditionally masculine. He always wanted me to join the Army, play football, learn to fight, grow muscle, and do things that were physical and manly and what he was brought up to enjoy. You can see the very obvious source of conflict here, as I had to reassert my desire to play music, to read books and talk about philosophy, to do sports that were ridiculous and absurd to most students, and to never, ever, ever talk about girls. I don’t really resent my father for any of this, but as chapter fifty-three continues to show how close Liesel and Hans are, I can’t say I relate. There are so many intersecting cultural and emotional reasons why we were never close, but I didn’t have a father who played catch with me, or showed me his work, who read to me, who played his accordion or passed on any sort of talent my way.

The champagne scene at the end of this chapter is a great example of a moment that I can’t comprehend on a personal level. Liesel’s first time trying champagne, with her father’s permission, is a brief moment of love and joy on Hans’s part, another secret that they can share between the two of them, but I have to remember that this is not the case for me. My father and I shared no secrets between us.

In the basement, when she wrote about her life, Liesel vowed that she would never drink champagne again, for it would never taste as good as it did on that warm afternoon in July.

I’m glad that Liesel cherishes this memory; knowing that there have to be hard times ahead of her, I’m hoping that all of these positive experiences that Death shares with us are a source of comfort for her, as these things sometimes are. Some days, all I have to rely on our those positive thoughts and experiences that ring true and joyous.

If only she could be so oblivious again, to feel such love without knowing it, mistaking it for laughter and bread with only the scent of jam spread out on top of it.

It was the best time of her life.

Which means….

Bold and bright, a trilogy of happiness would continue for summer’s duration and into autumn. It would then be brought abruptly to an end, for the brightness had shown suffering the way.

Hard times were coming.

Like a parade.

Let’s talk about that trilogy, shall we?

CH. 54: THE TRILOGY

Again, I can’t stress how much I enjoy that this book spends time with other characters. I love it. Even if some of the snippets are short and brief, I don’t think I expected Zusak to shift away from Liesel Meminger, but even the narrator is important enough to get his own parts.

Before chapter fifty-four, I don’t think I was able to articulate this creeping thought I had regarding Rudy Steiner’s very subtle change in attitude over the last hundred pages or so. I tried to find a way to bring it up the last time we focused on him, but I thought I was reading way too much into these pages. Well, I read too much into EVERY page by design, but when I start thinking MARK YOU’VE GONE TOO FAR, it’s probably a good idea to stop.

But now it seems much more obvious: Rudy Steiner is starting to get more serious. And that doesn’t mean he can’t be lovingly insulting or silly, as being serious doesn’t mutually exclude any of his other traits. There’s just not much of the younger Rudy we’ve seen over the course of this book right here in chapter fifty-four. Well…ok there is some of that here, as the way he proceeds to make an attempt to meet his goal of winning four medals at the Hitler Youth carnival is very Rudy Steiner, completely reckless and absurd and if anyone could do it, it’s Rudy.

Initially, I believed the title to be a reference to the trilogy of medals that Rudy wins, but we’ll soon see that’s not the case. I want to focus on Rudy for now, because here’s something I do relate with, completely and wholly. Of all the sports I chose to do in junior high and high school, I stuck with running. Anything that involved running, and for a long time, I was into, with the exception of just one semester of soccer, where I was bullied off the team. NO SAD STORIES HERE, THOUGH. So I’m skipping this to talk about how running just clicked for me. Maybe the bullying contributed to that, though. And literally, until this exact moment of me writing this review, I had never considered that. Maybe because I was so used to the physical and mental pain that came from being abused and bullied, I could run very far distances quite fast because that pain was nothing. I’d experienced far worse than that in my life.

Yes, I like that. I rather like it a lot.

That newly formed theory aside, long distance running is as much (and probably more) a mental sport as a physical one, though, like Rudy, I spent many a cloudless, baking afternoon training for a races so far in the future that the tasks set before me by my coach seemed obscene enough. I have to run six miles? But the race is only three! How am I ever going to run six?

But it was just something that, even to this day, I’m naturally good at. I like the sensation of being able to zone out and focus on little missions, like sprinting from one stop light to the next. What I do miss is competing. I’ve talked about racing in the past, and I’m going to try my best to avoid repeating myself here, but I just wanted to elaborate on why Rudy’s scenes at the carnival resonated so strongly.

For being a rather clumsy person, it’s still a miracle that I never killed myself running. I was always a solid racer who, every so often, got a burst of luck and talent that allowed me to win. But I remember setting goals like Rudy in those days: Today, I’m going to place in the top 25. That’s it. That’s just what I’m going to do. And you get this determination in your head where you actually convince yourself that it’s been done already, and you’re just going to relive your victory when the race actually arrives.

Reading through Rudy’s races was a real joy. It’s nice to be able to read something and think, HEY I KNOW EXACTLY WHAT THAT IS LIKE.

He would not smile until he’d won all four.

THIS IS WHAT I WAS LIKE DURING TRACK AND FIELD. Traditionally, I would run the 800, the 1600, and the 3200. All in one single meet. I had a ridiculous amount of endurance in those days and I’m happy that I still have a lot of it. But yeah, during track meets? You did not fuck with me until the day was done. No joy, no jokes, no jovial joshing, NOTHING AT ALL. If I won a race or placed well for the team, there was a brief congrats from the coach and my teammates and then DRINK WATER, STRETCH, WATER, WATER, ELECTROLYTES, A SNACK, STRETCH, WARM UP, STRETCH and do it all over again. My walkman was my best friend those days.

I want to jump until after the carnival is over, after we’ve learned that Rudy didn’t win four medals as he planned, having been disqualified during the final one.

Before they proceeded to their respective homes, Rudy’s voice reached over and handed Liesel the truth. For a while, it sat on her shoulder, but a few thoughts later, it made its way to her ear.

* * * RUDY’S VOICE * * *
“I did it on purpose.”

Like Liesel, the statement confused the hell out of me, but unlike her, it took me just a second or two to completely understand it. All of her guesses as to why Rudy did this—three medals was enough, he was afraid to lose, he wasn’t Jesse Owens—could very well be right. It doesn’t matter, though. I know that I lost races on purpose plenty of times. Sometimes I didn’t want to experience the win. Sometimes giving up just felt right. Sometimes my heart wasn’t in it. Any way you look at it, though, it was my decision and it became my secret, something no one would ever know. (Well, I guess I just told you all some of them now. OOPS.)

We switch away from Rudy to the second part of the trilogy of joy, focusing on Liesel, as she finishes the book she stole from the mayor’s mansion and sets off on her own to acquire another book from that house. The process has become so normalized for Liesel that Zusak doesn’t even waste time explaining how Liesel gets in the house, and she ends up choosing a book solely based on the color of the binding. (Green. Good choice.)

Without Rudy, she felt a good degree of absence, but on that particular morning, for some reason, the book thief was happiest alone. She went about her work and read the book next to the Amper River, far enough away from the occasional headquarters of Viktor Chemmel and the previous gang of Arthur Berg. No one, came, no one interrupted, and Liesel read four of the very short chapters of A Song In The Dark, and she was happy.

It was pleasure and satisfaction.

Of good stealing.

Obviously, this is all a set up for the destruction to come, but I read another subtext here: the book thief is happiest alone and she’s going to be alone soon. It’s a portrait of Liesel without Rudy. But is she going to ever be this happy without him?

I imagine we’ll find out soon, but let’s just appreciate the final piece of the trilogy that summer, something completely unexpected and…well, you know!

Near the end of August, Rudy frantically bikes up to Liesel and tells her that she needs to come with him to see something. They ride up to Grande Strasse, to the mayor’s mansion, and what they see there is a clear sign that their thievery has not gone unnoticed.

Through the prickly branches, Liesel noticed the closed winow, and then the object leaning on the glass.

“Is that…?”

Rudy nodded.

Far up in the window of the library, leaning against the closed glass, is a book. It has to be a message or a trap, they surmise, and I love that Liesel can’t resist going to get it, trap or not. When she gets close enough, she sees that it’s a dictionary/thesaurus, which doesn’t stop her from continuing her quest, so she slides the window up and grabs the book, making a quick escape with Rudy. But they don’t get far when Liesel gets that familiar sensation that she’s being watched. She stops riding and turns around:

Certainly, she should have known this might happen, but she could not hide the shock that loitered inside when she witnessed the mayor’s wife, standing behind the glass. She was transparent, but she was there. Her fluffy hair was as it always was, and her wounded eyes and mouth and expression held themselves up, for viewing.

Very slowly, she lifted her hand to the book thief on the street. A motionless wave.

In her state of shock, Liesel said nothing, to Rudy or herself. She only steadied herself and raised her hand to acknowledge the mayor’s wife, in the window.

HOLY. SHIT. THE MAYOR’S WIFE KNEW ALL ALONG! Of course she did. Their acts of theft always came off so flawlessly. How could that have been possible, time and time again? Ugh, this is kind of breaking my heart?

Wait, no, it’s not. Because the letter….THE FUCKING LETTER. I don’t need to transcribe it for you, but it’s so emotionally important to Liesel and this whole goddamn story. The mayor’s wife is WARMING MY ICY, BLACK HEART.

The most important part of that letter, by the way, is Frau Hermann’s insistence that one day, Liesel come knock on the door to enter the library, not to enter it as a thief, though she makes no claim that she’ll stop her from doing that either. Immediately inspired by how touching this is, Liesel travels back to 8 Grande Strasse, alone, but is suddenly frozen with a strange fear, unable to knock.

Again, her brother found her.

From the bottom of the steps, his knee healing nicely, he said, “Come on, Liesel, knock.”

I wish I had kept track of where Liesel’s brother shows up for her. I know he did when she told off the mayor’s wife, but maybe there’s a pattern to why he chooses to appear in her head like this. Before, it was to make her stop, but now, it’s to convince her to continue on. She doesn’t, though, choosing instead to make her “second getaway” with Rudy. As Death describes, part of what she feels is guilt, mostly for not following through on Frau Hermann’s request. But there’s something working inside her, much deeper than this, that makes her think that she was somehow right not to knock.

You don’t deserve to be this happy, Liesel. You really don’t.

Can a person steal happiness? Or is it just another internal, infernal human trick?

Liesel shrugged away from her thoughts. She crossed the bridge and told Rudy to hurry up and not to forget the book.

They rode home on rusty bikes.

They rode home a couple of miles, from summer to autumn, and from a quiet night to the noisy breath of the bombing of Munich.

There are no good days left, are there?

About Mark Oshiro

Perpetually unprepared since '09.
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35 Responses to Mark Reads ‘The Book Thief’: Chapters 53-54

  1. monkeybutter says:

    I know my brother and I used to race rolling office chairs or try to ride them like skateboards

    Every take your kid to work day ever.

    If you take Rudy's intentional (?) false starts to his hesitancy to ask Leisel for a kiss, it seems like he's starting to worry about consequences. He's still ridiculous and silly, but he seems to know that he's not perfect or that everything is going to work out. I'm torn between feeling bad for him and being happy that he's maturing.

    ETA: I realized how that stupid it sounds to say that worrying means he's maturing, when worrying too much can prevent maturity. It's more that he's no longer jumping into things with childlike exuberance. And I completely forgot what I wanted to say about Liesel and Hans, and how, as a little kid, it's weird to see what your parents do when they're not at home. They have lives!

    • cait0716 says:

      I do think Rudy is starting to mature. There's a note that he's now both a serious student and a good athlete. I feel like he has all this potential and would group up into a wonderful adult. He does a good job of balancing when to goof off and when to be serious, which is a definite sign of maturity. I just wish it didn't have to get cut off.

      • ldwy says:

        Yes! He sounds so much like a kid I would have wanted to know, and someone who could become an adult I would want to know. It's so sad that he won't get to grow up.

      • monkeybutter says:

        Thanks, you stated it way better than I could!

  2. ldwy says:

    featuring:

    way too much joy for the oncoming storm

    I'm sorry, can I just say this:

    <img src="http://29.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lj3iur8BfO1qhkr65o1_500.png"&gt;

    • ldwy says:

      I actually think that image is a little corny (whatevs, really, I don't care, haha).
      I think more of Nine when I think of the Oncoming Storm, actually. Partly because he introduced me to the title, but also there's just something a little threatening about his quiet, controlled anger that's more like a storm building than Ten's rages.
      <img src="http://pics.livejournal.com/dameruth/pic/0001k78q.gif"&gt;

      • cait0716 says:

        Yes ninth doctor! He's the best doctor (she says not having seen a single episode with eleven yet). His anger is far scarier than ten's could ever be.

        • Gillyweed says:

          I've seen series 5 first, then one, four and just started 2 and 3. Honestly, I love all three of them, for different reasons, but I'm most attracted (as in: want him now!) to Nine. Ten and Eleven are adorable, but too… boyish for my taste, if that make sense, Nine is just, ungh. Also, I looooooove his smile 🙂
          Not really relevant to anything, but I missed Mark watches Doctor Who, and I need to share with someone. Also, Rory rules 😛

          • cait0716 says:

            I know! I wasn't as attracted to him at first, but he grew on me in a major way. With ten the attraction has remained fairly constant. But nine just keeps getting better.

            I'm still reading Mark Reads Doctor Who because I've fallen so far behind on this show. One way to make it last, I suppose 🙂

  3. Inseriousity. says:

    the complete duden dictionary and thesaurus

    featuring:

    way too much joy for the oncoming storm

    LOL never noticed that when I read it, I must have been reading very fast. Whenever I see oncoming storm, I think of the Doctor now. 🙁

    Mayor's wife is the best, to be so understanding and kind even though she's technically trespassing and stealing your property is very admirable!

    • Mauve_Avenger says:

      "way too much joy for the oncoming storm"

      "LOL never noticed that when I read it, I must have been reading very fast."

      That's because it isn't in the book; Mark added it himself.

  4. anninyn says:

    Ok, I love this. The joy mixed with dread. The golden days- despite their poverty and hardship life is GOOD right now, and I understand that, I do. When I lived in the council estate and we were so poor we ate from the nearly-out-of-date stuff, and none of my toys or clothes were new there was something golden about it. I remember playing in burnt-out rusty cars with my friends and am shocked over how happy we were though we were back-breakingly poor.

    I vividly remember driving back from Wales with my family. We did camping, as it was cheap. Me and a friend had gone together. One the way back our car- A Triumph that was more rust than metal- started to tick ominously. Dad pulled into a layby just as the engine went 'huoooom' and bundled us all out. At which point the car started smoking. Me and my friend though it was hilarious, as my parents ushered us off to play in the field of wild flowers. We explored the FUCK out of that field. We found everything it had to offer. And an hour later we were being driven home IN A TOW TRUCK OH YES THIS IS AMAZING. We were so happy. As an adult I think of the danger and the stress and the financial hardship that must have faced my parents as their shitty car nearl;y set itself on fire. But all I can remember is the bright colours of the flowers and the tunnel in the thorns and the TOW TRUCK.

    • ldwy says:

      My family are campers too! That was usually our vacation in the summer, a few days in a tent in the woods. I loved it, and as a child didn't realize the that we were also saving a lot of money compared to other types of trips. I still love it.
      Sometimes it's so interesting to look back as an adult and realize how wonderfully oblivious and optimistic you were as a child. A tow truck is fun! Not a financial burden indicative of a safety hazard.

      • anninyn says:

        Oh god, camping was brilliant. By the age of six I could put up a tent and build an emergency shelter out of sticks! We went on camping holidays, most of which wer spent walking around fr3ee historical parts of the country while my parents made up stories. We very rarely went to a 'paid attraction- perhaps only once on a two week holiday?

        The thing is, I never thought of us as POOR back then. I was a kid, and all my friends had similar money. It was only when my dad started being financially successful and we moved into a nicer house in the country I realised we'd been poor. I had a friend who's mum was really well-off- nice hosue, expensive car, bikes etc, and that brought home my comparitive poverty more than anything else.

  5. cait0716 says:

    I love this little trilogy of happiness. Everything is so good and golden right now.

    I went to work with my dad exactly once and it was one of the most awkward days of my life. He was a bigshot at the company and I was on display all day long. I didn't even get introduced by my own name, it was always "John's daughter." It was so uncomfortable.

    My first experience with champagne was very similar to Liesel's. I was 14, and the calendar was about to flip over into the new millennium. My aunt and uncle had bought a really nice bottle of champagne for the occasion. I was given small glass and I really had to fight not to spit it back out. It was just too sweet and bubbly and I hated it. I've since grown to love champagne, and I kind of regret not appreciating that nice champagne. I've had far too much Cook's and Andre since. Far too much.

    • stellaaaaakris says:

      Andre! I had so much Andre when in college, even though I hate champagne. I remember there was a time me and my friends were going to a party and we took quite possibly the longest route to get there (50 minutes instead of 15). But it was all right because we had brought 2 bottles of Andre and passed them among ourselves on the walk over. Memories.

    • Gabbie says:

      The champagne scene reminds me of the multiple times during our Christmas dinner, when my dad would always ask my older two sisters if they'd like a sip of his wine. The oldest would sip it and the second oldest could never get past the sharp smell. Two years ago, I was offered a sip (FOR THE FIRST TIME!! I FELT SO MATURE.) and almost spit it onto the bread platter. But I gulped it down so I'd feel like an adult and just tried to wash the taste out with ice water.
      I don't know, Liesel's reaction just reminded me of my own. But I somewhat vowed never to drink it again, except not with the same sentiment as her. And instead of champagne, it was wine.

  6. ldwy says:

    Okay, back to being serious about The Book Thief. I loved this section, if only because I desperately wish the characters could hold onto these happy times and be spared whatever horrible, tragic thing we know is coming.

    About once a year my dad used to let me go to work with him. It wasn't a formal "Bring your kid to work day" or anything, he'd just pick a day in the summer. I was home from school, and being an accountant, that's after busy season, so he could have a slow day. He worked at least an hour from our house. We'd get up early for the long commute, and on the way he'd take me to IHOP (the International House of Pancakes, for anyone not familiar). There weren't any IHOPS near home, plus we didn't go out to eat hardly ever, so it was a huge treat. Plus it was just the two of us. We'd eat pancakes and then continue on. He worked for an accounting firm, and had an office shared with one other person. So I'd get set up in there with my own chair on the other side of his desk. I'd always bring a book, a coloring book, paper and crayons. Things to keep me occupied, because he did actually work. Whenever he needed something photocopied, it would be my job to go to the copy machine and do it! (I'm sure he had to reteach me every time). Sometimes the secretaries would have me help them with office-y things, and I'd go hang out with them for awhile. I remember there was one secretary at the front desk who befriended me and would find things that I could help with. She was a very fashionable lady, who always had really long fingernails with bright colored nailpolish or designs, and I thought she was so glamorous. Plus several of the accountants and others in the office kept candy dishes on their desks, so I would take a walk around the whole floor, go down each corridor, and collect one candy from each bowl. (Sometimes I'd make more than one trip!) It felt like I'd be there for ages, but it was only half a day. My mother (and younger sister, until she was old enough to come too) would drive up at lunch time and we'd all go out to lunch (eating out twice in one day!) and then I'd go home with Mom and Dad would scramble to get actual work done in the afternoon. It was always a big deal, and very special. I didn't really understand what he did at all. But they're good memories.

    I am SO NOT a runner. My family has bad knees, they're kind of wibbly-wobbly and unbalanced, and I will just never be a distance runner, ever. I played softball and did dance all through my childhood. Some volleyball too. Not really sports with a lot of running. So I don't have the same relation to and understanding of Rudy. But I'm impressed by anyone with that talent and endurance. Like Liesel, I didn't really understand at first why he'd throw the last race. I'm still not sure I entirely understand it. But I do think it could be some combination of all the reasons Liesel and Mark and we might think of.

    Finally, I am so happy that the Mayor's wife (Ilsa Herman, right?) has been in the know and understands and allows Liesel to keep taking books. I really respect the way she reached out to Lisel and invited her back in the house as a guest. I hope at some point Liesel will take her up on it.

    The longer it takes to get to the terror we know is coming, the more antsy I get. Not that I want it to come faster, I'm good with the happiness. I'm just so nervous.

  7. Keri says:

    I cannot tell you how happy it makes me that your reading this book! It's so good but…so sad…
    TEARS ARE COMING. THERE WILL BE TEARS, EVERYWHERE.

  8. @raelee says:

    They also made it work in Zombieland with the rules.

  9. Ellalalalala says:

    Hey wow, I was thinking last night about how I'd adapt The Book Thief for film, and decided it'd have to integrate animation of some kind. Great minds! LET'S DO IT, DO IT NOW!!

  10. Ellalalalala says:

    Hans Hubermann, you have my heart.

  11. Mauve_Avenger says:

    Am I the only person who 1) cringed at the idea of Rudy bringing that much attention on himself (at a meeting of Nazi paramilitary groups, no less) and 2) thought that his loss was a deliberate attempt to offset that attention?

    Maybe it's just the case that hindsight is 20/20 (certainly, Rudy can't know how big this war is going to be), but at the very least Rudy knows that there is a war going on and that the Hitler Jugend group he belongs to is training for the Luftwaffe. I don't really know if Rudy has internalized those facts yet (especially as they haven't yet seen the more terrible effects of the war where he lives), but if he has, it might be a very smart move for him to make sure the HJ leadership does have reason to remember him above the rest.

    Of course, winning those first races would counter that purpose, and losing in that particular way on the last one wouldn't be too much of a reason to think he'd be a bad soldier, but I think that maybe Rudy was trying to balance his childish need for revenge and oneupmanship with a more adult concern for the consequences of winning on his own personal safety, and, still being more of a child at the moment, the revenge motive won more ground.

    Perhaps Rudy is just now learning that navigating this environment is going to be harder than "Leadership I don't like—-Behave badly" and "Leadership I do like—-Do my very bestest."

    • ldwy says:

      You make some amazing points. I too wonder if it occurred to Rudy that he was doing a little too well.

  12. Mauve_Avenger says:

    I may be misremembering, but I think Man on Fire also had words as physical objects in the movie, but I don't think they ever interacted with the characters in any way.

    I think it would do a lot better as an animated movie (I'm imagining it something like the "Three Brothers" section of the Deathly Hallows movie, sort of shadow puppet-y and sparse), if only because we'd get to see the more eccentric things Death says in a more literal way, like having Rosa actually be made of cardboard. There's actually a music video I saw recently that reminded me of Trudy White's artwork for the book (esp. The Standover Man), with words incorporated into the animation in some scenes, though again, the characters didn't interact with the words at all. And I forgot to add the video, and now it won't embed. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HBC-KroRy5o

    I've heard that Fox Searchlight has already optioned The Book Thief, though obviously I don't know if the movie will actually get made. There are even trailers floating around on movie sites labeled "offlicial movie trailer," though they're clearly not official trailers (obvious use of Adrien Brody from The Pianist was obvious).

  13. ldwy says:

    I agree. I really can't pick a favorite. They all have aspects that I absolutely adore. And in the progression, their characters and performances are all so linked. I wouldn't want one without the others.
    Love love love.

  14. QuoteMyFoot says:

    I think Book Thief would make a terrible movie. However, I think it would be the most amazing stage production. Death could be another character on the stage who everyone ignores, and slip the audience his little asides every now and then. He'd stand at the back, or to the side, away from everyone, maybe even just wander amongst the audience – mostly. But there would be times when he'd be right at their shoulder. Like Werner's death. He'd be standing beside Liesel and her Mama whilst they looked at the grave, maybe with Werner in his arms or sitting on his shoulders. And then he'd quietly lead Werner away offstage, but come back in time to see Liesel pick up The Gravedigger's Handbook.

    …No, I have not had too much time to think about this.

    • ldwy says:

      For many reviews people have been throwing around all these ideas for styles of movie adaptation, and while they really are great ideas, I haven't been able to shrug the feeling that if this get's turned into a movie, it couldn't help but be massively disappointing. So much so that if this happens, I might not go see it, just to preserve my love of all things The Book Thief.

      Your vision of a stage show, however? It sounds like it could be really touching and effective, and if you write it, and it is performed, I will be there to see it in a heartbeat. Your idea is beautiful, and I think it could really work.

  15. ldwy says:

    I totally understand this, the first time I went to a funeral, my great uncle's, I had no clue what was going on. What finally made me cry was seeing my older cousins crying-then I knew something was wrong, even if I still didn't understand it.

    Just a little aside-you mention really wanting to swim during your grandfather's funeral, and it got me thinking about my own grandfather. My grandparent's lived by the ocean, and I definitely associate them with being able to go swimming. When my grandfather died, I wasn't really a child anymore, I was sixteen. It was January and it was hellishly cold. We stopped at the beach near their house on the way to the funeral, and the ocean had frozen. The whole little bay their house was near was frozen, and the ice still had the frothy look of waves. That's how cold it was. The ice was shifting around and creaking and groaning, from the water still moving underneath. It was one of the most beautiful and eerie things I have ever seen. And it was entirely the opposite of how I usually associated my grandfather with the ocean in summer.

  16. xpanasonicyouthx says:

    Scott Pilgrim DID make it work, now that you point it out.

  17. Gabbie says:

    In Chapter 53, with the little snippet of Liesel's writing, I realized (realized more in the sense that I was like, "Oh. OH! I was supposed to know that this whole time…" Sad but true.) that Death is only telling the story because of Liesel's autobiography, and that he wasn't there for any of these moments besides three. (See: The Prologue.)
    You are probably thinking, "Get this girl off the internet. That's pathetic! You JUST realized that?"
    Yes. Yes, I did. 😀

  18. Gabbie says:

    I thought about this as well. But I also think it would be confusing to those who didn't read the book, with the other-characters-besides-Liesel snippets. And how there's a lot of hidden meanings in Death's narration that make this book so great, which would need to be included as voiceovers in the movie then.

  19. Oh my gosh, this book is amazing. You're awesome for reading and reviewing it! I love Rudy. And Hans. And all of them, really.

  20. Lindsey says:

    Mark: "Yes, I like that. I rather like it a lot."
    Zusak: "Personally, I quite like that. . . Yes. I like that a lot."
    😉

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