29th October 2018

Colours, let me start by saying the word red, what comes to mind first? Some of you will be thinking love, maybe others will be thinking rage, maybe even an event a sunset, maybe a blood gruelling injury the list goes on.  This is just one of the many examples of the relationship or symbolism between colours and personal experiences. Red black and white constantly displays how colours can impact your maturation, and your physical, mental and social well being. Red, black and white have significance throughout the text representing the Nazi Germany flag and Nazi Germany’s ethics that are negatively rubbed off into the innocent Germany society. Red, black and white caused families and neighbourhoods to go through significant changes and suffering like the Hubermanns in the small town of Molching in this book. Red black and white are three different perspectives in themselves.

One way to perceive colour in the text is through pathetic fallacy a huge amount during the text which is the relationship between your emotions and the weather. Let’s all start of with white. White “of the blinding kind,” or white that is soft and pure either way is a dominating factor and can consume someone’s life exactly like it did for Liesel Meminger’s, who had her own physical perspective witnessing her own brother slowly die to due to malnourishment and hypothermic conditions which caused her to have a mentally different perception through her own eyes on life. “Something white, of the blinding kind,” shows how strong and sharp this white is. I personally feel there is a hyraces of colours, this hyraces showing the strength like a chart, white being innocent and black at the other end being deathly. White isolates an unwanted innocence on Liesel and her family therefore we are influenced in the book to have this perception towards the book that white is bad. Haven’t we all gone through a period in our life, where life has thrown us a bunch of white, where you are in a situation that you cannot get out of, where everything seems to be against you, where this white is so empowering you have an unwanted innocence. Like exams for example what do you think of when you see this photo, all that white paper, stacks on stacks, it’s hard, mentally challenging but you get through it, as did Liesel the protagonist in this text. Innocence is white, innocence is young children, not knowing what the world has in store for them, this event Liesel is in consumes her for a prolonged period. The protagonist is innocent not only to the world but also to everyday privileges most other kids would get nowadays like food, loving parents and an education. Being exposed to this high level of innocence or this feeling of white I believe caused Liesel for a long period of time to not be able to mature and have this trust or feeling of safety hence why Markus Zusak highly signified white throughout the text. World War 2 I believe will have impacted many kids maturation mentally from being exposed to white, compared to the well natured world WE have today, almost growing up in a baby blue or a soft white world,  which is caring.

Throughout the text we are commonly reminded about the colour black as death is the narrator. Wouldn’t we all right now when I say the word black we would perceive it to be associate with death, or when I say black we would perceive it to be associate with death. Perception on black and all different colours can come down to our personal selves. Our personal perceptions although maybe handy in our book responses may not be when analysing a text as you must come in it with a unbiased opinion. Otherwise we aren’t able to look at different perspectives on how for example Liesel may see the colour or how the author may see the colour. Having this biasedness although gives your own perception. The swastika is coloured black and ironically Germany who was supposed to all great and mighty while being bombed the sky was “black crumbs and peppers streaked across the redness.” Streaked blackness reflects the Nazi German country and how divided and dark some places and people feel. The hyraces of colours, black sitting right on top, it feels to  empowering, a movement, an evolution however this is only how i perceive it. You might perceive it as something you thrive of or though i hope not. Rudy has this unawareness and perceives black just to be any other normal colour and race during this time, perceiving and having this innocence to the unknown shows how good morally his parents and upbringing has been in our own ideal world today but how yet dangerous it could be, as as I previously mentioned the Nazi Party did thrive of this colour.What do we percept black as?it can be an emotion some we try to hide away. Not showing or presenting it to world, as the darkness in an individual in society is highly criticised as it is seen as a negative or a floor. People commonly throughout society try to physically show a different colour on the outside to be portrayed as a better person. The Nazi party philosophy was which was they thrived from blackness, which is their inner beliefs but tried to present themselves victorious to the people of Germany, to “Make Germany great again,” and be this superior race how ironic lets not even get started on that quote.

Once Adolf hitler became leader of Germany, what did he want to do? Anybody? Well he had a moral that he wanted to wipe away the history of Germany. Believe it or not Hitler licked his lips over this red. He did this via the use of red, the book burning “when she (Liesel) snatched a book from beneath a steaming pile of ashes.” Ash has red embers scattered throughout it reflecting the division of the German society, as we historically the nazi party made it seem as though they were winning the war to the citizens to only be completely lying. I preview ash to only have small amounts of embers that will eventually fade away, hence reflecting the leaders of the nazi party that have these strong beliefs. The nazi party was trying to create a communism, shedding blood for one another via the use of red. Red dominates Germany for a period of time hence germany civilians had this very clear and almost cemented into their brain that in order to survive you must show a fake red of communism to protect themselves from authorities, exactly like the Hubermann’s situation. Families not only had to be put through the this two sidedness but also events throughout towns like the bombings of towns commonly seeing the sky like “soup, boiling and stirring. In some places it was burned.” Red is used a symbol by Zusak to describe the terrible situations that are occurring from deaths perspective to convey how common these horrible events are but make them further intimidating. This colour is used to implement something bad is about to occur and the overall impact depends on the strength of the red. I believe having this high exposure to all three colours would definitely have a huge impact on your life, and change the way you perceive it when this colour reappears. Calling this red soup indicates how thick and hearty this catastrophic situation is. Hence when Liesel is older imagine another situation a red sunset for example just imagine how her past would come flooding back, Hans, Rosa, and Rudy gone.The author shows through various ways like the book burnings and bombings that once Germany leaders have planted a seed of red to be communist and share blood for your country and race in a deceptive way. It bounces back as karma impacting innocent German civilians lives.

Now what did we learn here, maybe you learned nothing. Maybe you got lost in a train of thought on what you interpreted Black, red or white to be. Maybe you thought of other colours like blue, yellow or green. “The book thief,” gives us an idea on how to have an open mindness when we are reading or almost doing anything in our everyday life. It teaches us to sit back before making judgements brining in a complete new thought to the situation which is almost impossible for the world we live in today.