From Bowen Library
The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
Reviewed by LaVoe Mulgrew

There are no shortages of literary works about Nazi Germany. From the sweet story of Anne Frank to the absurdist tale in Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse Five, this most evil of times in the history of humankind does not lack for literary examination. Now comes a new work to add to the library shelf: Markus Zusak’s brilliant if flawed novel The Book Thief.

The novel is the story of nine-year-old Liesel Meminger who steals a book at her brother’s funeral. Entitled The Grave Digger’s Handbook, this work begins Liesel’s fascination with the written word. She carries the book with her to her foster home, and it is this book that her saintly new father, Hans, uses to teach Liesel to read.

The Book Thief is narrated by Death, a rather interesting but ultimately obvious choice for a storyteller recounting the tale of innocents during Hitler’s reign. While Zusak’s idea for the narrator may have started out a good one, ultimately Death turns out to be a rather bland raconteur. In fact, the reader becomes so absorbed in the novel at times it is easy to forget who is telling the story, not the best plug for the narrator of a 552-page book.

But so what. Ultimately The Book Thief is not a story about death but rather about the power of books. After Liesel learns to read, she begins a life of thieving books. She isn’t picky. She’ll take any kind of book, from a manuscript heaped on a pile burning books in the city streets to an arcane work of fiction found in the personal library of the mayor’s wife. What Liesel has is a passion for the written word, and it is the stories in these books that sustain her through the bleakest of times. Zusak may have done well to ditch Death as his narrator and let Liesel tell her own story as a means for underscoring the power of words.

The novel gets a much-needed plot punch when Max, a 24-year-old Jewish boxer, comes on the scene. Max is the son of Hans’ fellow soldier who died in World War I. Fulfilling a promise Hans made to the dying father, he allows Max to hide out in the family’s basement in hopes of escaping the inevitability of death at the hands of Nazi soldiers. An endearing and powerful friendship develops between Max and Liesel that is portrayed through words, again a reminder of the novel’s central theme.

The Book Thief is a must read for anyone who loves words and accepts the power they have to transport and transform. Liesel has every reason imaginable to grow into a bitter, harden person devoid of hope. But she doesn’t. Her unfailing belief in stories not only keeps her sane and grounded through the horrors of the War, but also allows her to become a thoughtful, generous person defined by hope. And finally it is that sense of hope in the most hopeless of situations that assures us that evil does not win out in the end. The Book Thief isn’t a perfect work of fiction; it is for the most part more clever than profound. Nonetheless, Zusak is to be commended for his creative courage to add this endearing story to the canon of Holocaust literature.