This New York Times Bestseller Novel, The Boy in the Striped Pajamas takes you on a journey through the eyes of a nine-year old boy from Berlin, Germany.
A young boy named Bruno leaves his beautiful five-story home in Berlin with his family and arrives to a place called Out-With. Out-With is the residence near the concentration camp that his father became the Commandant. Bruno’s loneliness, unhappiness, and boredom of staying in his home in Out-With leads him to go exploring. He stumbles towards The Dot that Became a Speck that Became a Blob that Became a Figure, which is a title of a chapter in the novel. This figure is a boy named Schmuel wearing a pair of striped pajamas sitting behind a tall fence.
My favourite part of this novel is when Bruno and Schumuel become friends. Bruno has a very sheltered perspective of the world when he arrived to Out-With and when he was living in Berlin. Once he learned about Schmuel’s life experiences, his perspective of the world broadened.
I highly recommend this novel to anyone who likes learning about history, the importance of family, the building of friendship, and learning a powerful and memorable message behind the Holocaust.
From this blog post, it seems that this novel is excellent in introducing a difficult, but important topic of history such as the Holocaust. I love that there is an underlying theme of friendship which shines through, even in such a devastating time.
Thank you for sharing this post with us! This is such a moving book about the Holocaust that is a great way to introduce it to students at an early age.
I watched this movie and balled my eyes out. I’ve never read the book, but based on your review I’m going to add it to my list of books to read.
I read this book and loved it as well. It has such a powerful and beautiful message to everyone reading about the importance of equality, friendship, and rights. To those who do not know much about the history of the Holocaust, this book illustrates and represents an important perspective and point of view.
Thank you for the review! It is a lovely book, eloquently written, and accessible to a wide range of readers of all ages. It’s a unique and artful book that engrosses the reader and a point of introduction for young learners to the history of WWII, Nazi Germany and the Holocaust.
Hello! Thank you so much for sharing this book with us.
The topic of the Holocaust is very upsetting, but necessary to discuss. The way you describe the book sounds like it is a really great way to introduce this difficult topic in an approachable manner – through the lens of a boy. I would imagine this would remove some barriers to understanding, and present the material in a way that students can connect with (in small ways) that can help them comprehend such a abstract issue.
I wonder what other books there are for kids, told through the lens of a child, about other difficult historical times such as war.