Published in 2005, Book Thief is a masterpiece by Australian author Marcus Susak, which has been on the New York Times bestseller list for more than 10 years, has been translated into more than 40 languages, and was adapted into the film of the same name by Brian Pasieville, the director of Hollywood who had directed Downton Abbey in 2013. This novel is a novel that deeply reveals the power of words and is well worth reading.
From the perspective of a unique third person, the Grim Reaper, the book tells the story of a street called "Paradise" on a small town in Munich, Germany, which took place during the Second World War, a girl, an accordion, a German boy with lemon-colored hair, a Jewish boxer and some stolen books. In that period when we did not have enough to eat, clothe and warmth, and we were ready to avoid air raids, we felt the light emitted by those words from behind the story, the warmth of those words, and the power to soothe emotions and soothe wounded hearts.
Life always has to face a lot of loneliness, confusion, wandering, loss and pain, perhaps at this time, words are the best companion, it can give you the most beautiful hope and indestructible strength. Think back to how long you haven't picked up a book, how long have you not felt the touch of that ink, and how long have you not been soaked in the fragrance of books.
I'm afraid of people who read. As they read, their faces are hidden behind the book. As soon as the book was put down, it shone before me in the image of a noble king. Throwing your hands and feet is a gesture of ease. Let me understand that reading is not only knowledge, but also magic. They were Newtons who understood aesthetics. Van Gogh who understands anthropology. Gandhi who knew Sun Tzu's art of war. The blood is full of answers, and fewer and fewer questions can make them afraid. It is as if standing on the shoulders of giants, accustomed to looking down on everything. That confident and calm is the best face in the world. ——Copywriting from Ogilvy & Mather
This passage is a particularly good illustration of the power of words and the joy of reading, and then we will understand the beautiful and somewhat bleak story told by this grim god of death through a story and three key words of commitment, warmth, and words.
Gravedigger's Handbook dropped in the snow
The story begins under a chocolate-colored sky, covered with snow everywhere, and a speeding train. Winter, perhaps doomed, would not be a pleasant story, of a mother with two children sitting on a speeding train while the girl Lizel had witnessed the death of her brother. In those days, there wasn't much time to grieve for the dead, and her brother's body was buried in a place where no name was known, but Lizelle didn't want to believe that her brother had left her forever, yes, he was only 6 years old.
The gravedigger who buried his brother hurried away, but dropped a black book, which Lizer quietly picked up and hid in the clothes of the suitcase. This black book opened Lisel's reading path, and after this first successful experience of stealing books, Lizelle also began a brilliant career of stealing books later, she owned a total of 14 books, of which 8 were "stolen".
Her father was arrested, her brother died, and her mother would leave her. Lizel was sent to the small town of Morsing in Munich, where there was a house in the street called Paradise, where Lizelle would continue her life.
Here there is a man named Hans, a painter who can play the accordion, and a woman named Rosa, who is rude but cute, and they will become Lizel's new mom and dad. Here, Lizel will also meet the most important friend of her life, Rudy, the boy who painted her whole body black to run and aspired to become Jesse Owens.
There was also Max, the Jewish boxer who had gone to the basement to escape Nazi persecution, and the mayor's wife who let Lizel into the study to read, and Lizel's 6 books were later stolen from the mayor's house. In that era of war and chaos, in addition to enduring hunger and bombs flying from time to time, there are books to nourish the soul, and books will help Lizaire survive the most difficult times and save her life.
Lizel of reading
Hans Hubermann, Lissell's adoptive father, a man with warm eyes, a man who escaped two world wars and did not die on the battlefield. At the time of World War I, when Hans was twenty-two years old, the governor was asking, "Who's writing well?" But no one answered, and finally it was Max's father who recommended Hans, and on this day Hans was writing letters for the commander, and the others went to the battlefield, and none of them returned, and Max's father was beaten into a sieve on a hill, leaving only a bloody accordion.
At the end of the war, Hans took the accordion to visit the wife of his comrade-in-arms, whose son Max was only 2 years old at the time, told his comrade's wife about his rescue and promised that he could come to him with any help in the future, leaving a note with his name and address, and the wife of the comrade gave Hans the accordion left by his comrade.
In the blink of an eye, many years have passed, and the second time I saw Max was this Jewish boy who came to seek asylum, in that era of white terror, no one wanted to have anything to do with Jews, and Hans, in order to repay Max's father's life-saving grace and fulfill his promise, hid this Jewish boy in the basement of his house and began a life of fear.
Hans was a sentient, righteous, responsible man, who had no source of income in his family, and who took in a Jew, in addition to having one more person to eat, in fact risking losing his life at any time when he was discovered. He not only taught Lizelle to read with his actions, but also taught Lizaire many truths about being a human being, one of the most important of which was to keep his promises.
Hans who plays the accordion
Although the story takes place in that terrible era, there are many places full of warmth. It's touching.
The boy next door with lemon-hair, Rudy, guards Lizelle everywhere, and he accompanies her to school, accompanies her to deliver clothes, accompanies her to steal, accompanies her to play football. The boy who only wanted a Kiss from Lisel, running in the snow and falling and covered in mud, the boy who jumped into the river in spite of the cold and was drenched in the book, and the kiss he was looking forward to was only gotten after he had been killed by the air raid.
They did a lot of ridiculous things together and also established a deep friendship, he liked her and she liked him. They went to steal the apple, in order not to explain to the family how the apple came from, they had to eat 6 apples each before going home, and finally Lizel came home and vomited; the two of them picked up a coin on the way to deliver clothes, bought a lollipop, because there was no way to divide it into two, so they licked it 10 times each, and it was unbearable to see these places, what a beautiful friendship.
Rudy and Lizel running in the snow
Remember the best-feeling classmate from childhood? Where is he now? How long have you not been in touch, and how often do you see each other? Maybe give him a call and talk about your childhood fun.
Max, the Jewish lad, was so heart-wrenching. Just to save his life, he lived a dark basement life. After a snowman build, Max fell completely ill and unconscious. And in all these days Lisaire stayed at his bedside, reading for him every day, bringing small gifts from outside every day, such as a feather, a broken football, until he finally woke up when the thirteenth gift was placed at the head of Max's bed. Seeing this place will make people can't help but cry.
Maybe there is such a person in your life who suddenly breaks into your life and brings you touches and surprises. But like he came in a hurry, he left in a hurry, and to this day you still miss him.
Max, who lives in the basement
The mayor's wife, a somewhat peculiar character in the book, burned books in the town square on the night of Hitler's birthday, and Lizel's whole process of stealing back a book that was not burned in the fire that night was witnessed by the mayor's wife. But instead of denouncing Lizel, she led Lizelle into her study when she came to the house to deliver her laundry, and let Lizel study here.
The mayor's wife's son John died on the battlefield at a very young age, and the books in the study were all of her son's, and the mayor's wife liked Lisel very much, and when she saw her obsessive reading, she thought of her son. After lizel's adoptive mother could no longer be washed for some reason, she wanted to give her a book that Lizelle liked. Later, after discovering that Lizel had gone to the study and stolen two books, the mayor's wife was not angry, but placed a dictionary in the window and deliberately let Lizel steal it.
Many times, what we see is not necessarily real, and it is difficult for us to understand others well from our own point of view. Just as Lizelle was very angry that the mayor's wife no longer washed clothes with her adoptive mother. But sometimes, some people are involuntarily. Everyone has their own grievances. We should be more tolerant and accepting of others.
Lizel reading in the mayor's wife's study
If there had been no war, perhaps these people could have lived a good life in that place called Paradise Street, reading, writing, talking about the future, and listening to Hansela's accordion, who played so well. It is also possible to look up at the stars at night. But at that time, everyone was more worried about the plane flying in the sky at night, because the bomb it dropped would flatten a small town at any time. Fortunately, there are still words, and books to soothe people's hearts.
The thread of words runs through the entire novel, and it is also the transparent line that wears the pearl necklace. The first book Lizel owned was the Gravedigger's Handbook, which fell from the gravedigger who buried her brother, and it was this book that started Lizelle's journey of literacy. The next two books are Faust the Puppy and The Lighthouse, which Hans gave Lizel for his adoptive father Hans at Christmas in exchange for his own cigarettes. Then there was "Shrugging My Shoulders," which was stolen from the book burning site on Hitler's birthday.
Mein Kampf was bought by Hans for a little change and ten cigarettes. Hans's twelfth birthday gifts to Lisel, "The Clay Man", "The Man Who Looks Down on Me" and "The Word Picker" were books drawn by Max himself and given to Lisel. Six other copies of The Whistler, The Dreamer, Song in the Dark, The Duden Dictionary, The Last Outsider, and Tommy Hoffman's Law were stolen from the mayor's wife's study. The last book is the story of the book thief who was read and read by the god of death, and it was written by Lizel.
Every night when she was awakened by a nightmare and couldn't sleep, Hans would accompany Lizel to read and circle all the words that Lizelle didn't recognize to help her learn. On the days when Max was unconscious, Lizel accompanied him to his bedside to read to him and wake him up. In those days when Max was hiding in the basement, Lizel read next to him to accompany the lonely Jew.
Going to the mayor's house every Thursday to deliver clothes is Liselle's happiest day of the week, because she can sit in the mayor's study and read her favorite books. In those days of extremely frightening air raids, Lizel read to everyone who hid in the basement to avoid air raids, and her voice made people forget their fears and listen quietly to the stories in the book, the words in the book gave people strength and soothed people's uneasy hearts.
Lisel reads for the unconscious Max
"The Book Thief", through the perspective of the god of death, reveals the final ending to each of us - yes, sooner or later we will die. Especially in that small town full of hunger and air raids, no one escaped, not even children like Rudy. Only Lizel, who was hiding in the basement and writing, escaped. And she also lost all the important people in her life, her adoptive father, her adoptive mother, Rudy, and maybe that was the tragedy of that era.
The only misfortune was that the book club would always accompany her. Of course, we are much luckier than Lizel, we were born in a peaceful era, we will not suffer from war, we will not go hungry, and we will not rely on stolen books to warm ourselves. But how many people are still as eager to read as Lizelle, eager to draw nourishment from books, eager to rely on books to nourish the soul.
Happiness is like us, but there are often sorrows and pains, sometimes because of work, sometimes because of love or affection, life may be like this, and what can make our hearts quiet is words.
We are accompanied by words, which is a wonderful process, it is not a process of simply reading, it is a series of pleasures that include reading, recording, observing, and writing.
Lizel writing in the basement
First of all, we rely on reading to absorb nutrition, and use the pen in our hands to record the feelings in reading, the author's method and style of word formation. You can prepare a good-looking book for writing and drawing during reading, even if it is just a record of the mood of reading the moment.
The second is observation, remember that there is a clip in "Charlotte" where Watson asks Charlotte how she found the problem, and Charlotte replies that because I am observing, and you are just watching. There is a big difference between seeing and looking. Only by being good at observation can you collect detailed information from life for your own use in writing.
Observation must be meticulous, just like a person walking across from him, what shape and color his trench coat button is, how many zippers he has on his backpack, etc., and then record it in a book with a verbal description, so that the observation and meticulous description can make you close your eyes and the image of this person appears in front of you.
The end is to turn your ideas into words, and maybe you will say that you didn't think about being a writer, and that's okay. Because the process of writing is the process of sublimation, you can write out what you think and what you see.
Sometimes you can even write down what you don't want to express, which is a great way to soothe your emotions. If you don't believe it, you can try, when you are in a bad mood, or when you are very angry and want to scold people, write these emotions on the paper, don't have to care about the wording, how to write. After writing it, you will find that you are in a good mood.
Finally, I will end with a passage from the famous French writer Dickens. This passage is a passage from Dickens's autobiography describing his childhood reading of his father's few books.
"In that little sacred room, they appeared inadvertently, like a group of angels surrounded by a holy light, with me... Every barn in the neighborhood, every stone in the church, every footprint in the cemetery, can make an association with these books in my heart. —Dickens
About the author: Yixin, a Beijinger living in Nanjing, a senior financial practitioner, a person who hopes to read thousands of books, travel thousands of miles, and meet interesting souls. Welcome to @Translate Heart Clear Shadow, talk about interesting things, talk about life.