Preview

War In The City Of Thief Analysis

Better Essays
Open Document
Open Document
1292 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
War In The City Of Thief Analysis
For several years, World War II had been raging in Europe. In 1945, German soldiers surrounded Russia and tried to choke off the train of supplies entering the country. Leningrad, Russia remained under constant bombing by German aircraft. Leningrad was a key location for Russia’s war efforts due to its manufacturing facilities and needed to stay functional. Lev Beniov was on the roof of his apartment building watching the anti-aircraft balloons above the city. It was on this night that a dead German paratrooper landed in front of Lev’s building. As the news reached all the boys and girls on the roof, they rushed down to examine and loot the dead soldier. Within minutes, Russian soldiers appeared. Lev’s friends deserted him and he was arrested and thrown into the Crosses. After spending the night, Colonel Grechko gave Lev a chance to redeem himself for his wrongs and save his life. Through …show more content…
After finding that his life had changed dramatically, he made the most of it and put forth effort to find the eggs for the colonel. It took some convincing by Kolya to move their efforts outside of Piter, which gave them a different perspective on the war, and how dangerous it really is. For these two boys, their focus was on finding the eggs for Colonel Grechko so that they could stay alive and get their ration cards back. The story of playing chess with the Einsatzgruppen general, shows how the fear of not surviving the war overcame their fear of facing a deadly general that could easily kill a Russian prisoner. Lev’s journey shows that it doesn’t take a soldier to act smart and survive the war. Lev proves in this story that he was willing to take on the colonels challenge and put his whole effort into the task. As the story evolves, Lev’s motives change slightly. However, the underlying fear of dying is always evident in his

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    Soldier X Summary

    • 476 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Erik Brandt is a 16 year old half Russian half German boy. He is in a program called Jungend which is also known as Hitler's Children Army. It is like Boy Scouts for German Kids. They boys in the Jungend are also enlisted soldiers who have to fight when it is needed. One day Erik is sent to fight in the war. He is shipped to the eastern front where the Germans have to fight Russia on Russian soil. Erik is uncomfortable because he is half Russian and German. He was aware of the things Germans were doing to Jews but he was convinced it was right and that Jews were preventing Germany's world domination. While traveling to Russia he becomes acquainted with some other boys in his platoon named Oskar, Jakob, and Fassnacht. They get attacks by aircraft and very few of the Germans die but the boys are pretty scared. When they reach their destination they go into the trenches and prepare to fight. Their commander explains the plan and teaches them how to use certain equipment like mines and grenades. When the first waves of Russians attack it is mainly infantry foot soldiers. The Germans win and Erik thinks it’s over and he is exhausted and tired. Then their commander says that was the easy one and tells them to prepare for tanks to start progressing. In the second wave the Germans start to drop and German hope looks lost. Erik is hit by a grenade and he is hurt. He is lying in pain in the bottom of a trench. With many dead bodies around him, he sees that playing dead won’t help because the Russians are stabbing every body they find with a bayonet. He knew he was running out of time. To his luck a tank broke down over him. He now has to think fast. He sees a dead Russian boy and puts on him uniform to disguise himself. He leaves the trench disguised as a Russian. As he is going he get shot by a surviving German in the side. He passes out and wakes up in hospital. When the soldiers he meets asks his name he says he has amnesia. He meets a young nurse in…

    • 476 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Ruth Pierce was an American citizen who found herself in Kiev during the time of the Soviet Union. In her book Trapped in “Black Russia” Pierce collected the diary entries and letters she wrote to her parents and Peter, between the time of June 30, 1915 to sometime in November 1915. Though her stay in Kiev she was arrested for espionage, forcing her to delay her travels in the fight to get her passport back. In these letters and diary entries she explains what is going on in Kiev, the movement of the German front line, and the struggles she faced. Remarkable personality traits are revealed from Pierce in her writing from her humanity, her significant other, Peter, and her constant update on war time needs without focusing the war going on around…

    • 1747 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Death is our guide and narrator to 'The Book Thief,' by Markus Zuzak. In some ways Death seems human as we see that he experiences both sadness and joy in the novel and even gets depressed. To help distract him from his sad, never-ending work, he often fixates on the colour of the sky as a distraction from the anguished survivors of the dead. Death faces suffering with dignity. He does not enjoy his never-ending job of collecting souls but he keeps persevering as he knows he must continue for the sake of the living. Like many humans, Death tries to find ways to give meaning to his…

    • 391 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    The events throughout the novel shape Lev, and act as an explanation for the behavior of the author’s fictional grandfather. Lev is a personified USSR, having been deeply affected by the situation forced onto them by the German invaders during a sensitive developmental period of their lives. Before chapter one, David Benioff writes in the point of view of a fictional author whose grandparents both experienced the Siege of Leningrad. To the unnamed author, the two were unlike the other retirees in Florida. “They don’t wear their seat belts in the car; they don’t wear suntan lotion in the sun. They have decided nothing can kill them but God himself…” (11). Modern day Russians are characterized as fearless, toughened by the history of their homeland. In this sense, the alleged author’s grandparent’s fit the description of the average Russian citizen, which is contextualized by the rest of the story. Lev’s character arc was heavily influenced by the books subject matter, with both being in opposition to Kolya’s personality. Despite their differences, both Kolya, Lev, and Leningrad were able to retain the humanity that their surroundings…

    • 992 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Thief Lord Book Assignment

    • 1626 Words
    • 7 Pages

    A3. The Thief Lord is about two brothers, who live with their aunt and uncle. When Esther and Max want to adopt Bo after their mother's death so the boys decide to run away to Venice, Italy. The boys arrive in Venice and are taken in by four other orphans: Hornet, Riccio, Mosca, and their mysterious leader, Scipio, or "The Thief Lord." The children survive by selling the things that Scipio steals from wealthy houses to an old shopkeeper, Ernesto Barbarossa. Prosper and Bo settle in to their new life; unbeknown to them, however, Esther and Max have deduced that they are in Venice, and they enlist the services of Victor Getz, a detective,…

    • 1626 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    The historical nonfiction book The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson provides a comparison between the impressive White City of the Chicago World's Fair and the horror of H.H. Holmes's murder spree. It starts off in 1890 when Chicago finds out it's going to be hosting the World's Fair of 1893. Winning the bid meant so much to Chicago because it indicated that the city would finally be able to shake off the perception that it was a hog-slaughtering, greedy and isolated city. The Fair would create a more positive global reputation for Chicago. Larson argues that it was Chicago’s pride that led its people to dream big enough to win the bid for the World’s Fair. They were motivated to outdo the Paris World’s Fair of 1889, that produced the…

    • 161 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    In The Book Thief, guilt can be found as a recurring theme, especially in the cases of Hans Hubermann and Max. In a deeper analysis, the reason as to how and why can be answered.…

    • 459 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    The passage I have chosen is from Chapter 5, book 1, which takes place at a wine shop. Dickens is using this passage to explain the recent event that has taken place; crowds of people gather in front of the wine shop, and actually scoop up the wine for themselves from the broken cask. That shows the readers that these peasants are in physical hunger and are that desperate for food, showing that France isn’t in good shape. Once all the wine is gone all that is left over is the stains of the red wine on the street, the peoples hands, faces and feet. Dickens is foreshadowing the blood that will be left there in later years during the revolution. Like I stated before Dickens is showing the peasants hunger, but I think he is showing the physical hunger and the hunger the peasants have for justice and that they want freedom from the misery they’re in, therefore I feel he is also foreshadowing that the peasants are going to revolt and that they’re will be some kind of revolution. When Dickens says “the wine was red wine”, it is symbolic in a way of showing the sense of revolution, because the peasants dressed themselves in the color red while revolting, but also the fact that red is symbolic by symbolizing the blood of all the peasants and people of France that will die in the fight for what they believe in. I also believe when Dickens closes this passage with the words wine-lees blood he is trying to say that although at that moment its just wine, eventually lives are taken and it turns into real blood, and that the blood will stain the streets of France, leaving a reminder of this terrible…

    • 307 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    In The Book Thief by Markus Zusak, one theme the author includes in the work is the power of knowledge.…

    • 554 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Author Gary Krist attitude and/or tone towards Mayor Thompson is portrayed quite frequently throughout the book City Of Scoundrels. Showing his response to how the Mayor handles each situation in each disaster or political event going on. From handling the race riots Krist portrays how involved Mayor Thompson tries to be with the situation alone. Lone his vast support base from the African Americans and his support he gives them, he stays distant when decisions have to be made. Though uses his respect for the African American community to find his way to ‘victor’. Thompson uses his ‘somewhat’ wise tactics to keep his public figure on the good side. Krist voices his opinion on how remote the Mayor keeps upon the choices he has to make, while…

    • 603 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Trojan War Analysis

    • 1042 Words
    • 5 Pages

    The epic story told in Trojan War is considered by many to be a starting foundation of Greek mythology and to other modern stories we still tell today. It is a story of envy, disloyalty, cleverness, and persistence that few stories can challenge. Greek myths such as The War on Troy tell of epic tales of gods and goddesses working together and even feuding among each other in order to create a more desirable world for themselves. They are the stories of people dealing with and overcoming personal and cultural issues as represented by the gods in a society where history and storytelling go hand in hand. These so called myths…

    • 1042 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    After the Civil War many of the “Lost Cause” advocates stated that their work was not political, this statement is proved correct as the majority of their work was social. The South’s desire to protect the “southern way of life” was the main cause of the “Lost Cause”. Reconstruction left behind the unfortunate legacy of unsuccessfully ending segregation among races in the South, as it did little to fix the issues that the Civil War was fought for.…

    • 618 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Duality exists in all aspects of the world- in the light of the stars against the dark of the night sky or the vibrant spring colors and the desolation come winter. The dual nature of this world has added deep lines between right and wrong, but of course both will present themselves and both will always, in some way, shape, or form, affect one another. In the Devil in the White City the author, Erik Larson, not only informs the audience about a colossal architectural turning point for our nation, but he entices the reader into a state of jittery tension that is enforced by continuous amounts of alarming duality.…

    • 1249 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    There are many differences in the film Coraline and the book The Thief of Always in character traits, settings, and events. First of all, Coraline is very adventurous while on the other hand, Harvey is sometimes very lazy. For instance, Coraline made the choice to go into to the locked door without any persuasion which means she is more adventurous, Harvey on the other hand only went because of the persuasion of Rictus. Next, when you arrive to the other world in Coraline you can see that it is creepier than the Holiday House. For example, when Coraline arrived she was VERY suspicious of the house, Harvey on the other hand, when he arrived he just thought it was a normal house. Lastly, when Coraline goes to sleep every night she wakes up back…

    • 174 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Charles Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities is a critically acclaimed classic novel. This novel has sold over 200 million copies and made its way onto reading lists everywhere. Demonstrating the plight of the French peasantry being demoralized by the aristocracy in the years leading up to the French Revolution through the eyes of both French and English persons, A Tale of Two Cities is a wonderful example of classic literature with exemplary historical setting, plot, characterization, and validity.…

    • 973 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Powerful Essays