1) What characters are introduced?
The Fleischmanns, the two Annamarie's friends and the Steiners.
2) Choose two characters and select a quote to describe them physically or psychologically.
Uncle Lajos: "We must accept God's ordinances in regard to us, at which she held her tounge".
So it is deduced that Lajos is a very religious person, one that handles Hebrew well.
Annamarie's friend: "We Jews are different from other people".
This quote gives a psychological profile of the character, one that realized that Jews were being excluded from society; so this character is a melancholi, realistic one.
3) What is the narrative technique? Provide evidence.
The narrator is in first person, and it is a protagonist narrator too: all the book is told in the perspective of George Koves. "This evening I was with her in the other room to look..." (Page 33)
4) Describe the setting of this chapter.
The setting is: Csespel, George's city of origin: Budapest (in which we can find his house and Annamarie's). The season was Summer. It was in the middle of WWII.
miércoles, 25 de abril de 2012
lunes, 16 de abril de 2012
Chapter 8 Summary
Chapter 8: The chapter opening includes Georg Koves in the Buchenwald camp, where he gives us a vision of how the showers where, and his excitement because of the hot water. He is transported into a real bed, with real treatment. For him, things were starting to change. Food started increasing, and he met a guy named November that was next to his bed. He tries to comunicate with the other patients that were with him; and also met a French doctor who gave him sugar lumps. The chapter continues with hope expectations, each time more atention, less hunger; better living. He spent in bed most of the time, knowing that now he has just survived.
Pietka is introduced in the novel as a new character, a man who valued freedom like nobody else. Later on, he stole a rifle; and say a few words to the whole camp: "We are free!"
Pietka is introduced in the novel as a new character, a man who valued freedom like nobody else. Later on, he stole a rifle; and say a few words to the whole camp: "We are free!"
viernes, 13 de abril de 2012
Oral presentation: Mazes in Chapter 8
* 1.- The maze or labyrinth remounts it’s origins in the greek culture, the first one was built by Daedalus for King Minos to contain the titan known as the minotaur. The mazes were distinguished beacuse of their complexity and miles of lenght, the ones who managed to enter and leave were considered heroes.
* Labyrinth were sometimes used as a way to punish prisoners, and many of them died inside because they didn’t managed to find the exit.
* The point here is that a maze can be considered many as a prison or a way to be trapped, taking the freedom away, and bringing a claustrophobic feeling. Mazes are even used in many pshycological tests to demostrate the tendence of independence that one has.
* There is also a phenonenom called “mental maze”, which means that the pacient has a limited vision of the world, is trapped in a mental illness to be psychollogically disturbed. An example of that is a case of a father that locked his daugter in the basement of the house for 24 years, in Austria, and the girl in the end needed 1 month of psychological treatment to answer the questions that the police made to her.
* 2.- Just as we saw in the interview with Imre Kertész, there is a comparisson between the labour camps and the labyrinths. Both have very similar functions , not specific ones but according to the message they want to transmit. Labour Camps and mazes have very similiar architecture, they are usually closed spaces with one entrance that was used as an exit too; they where made specially for locking up someone inside so they has solid mechanisms such as walls and paths.
* Both camps and mazes change people, insert fear in them. Both of them lows the self-esteem in prisioners, and increase the claustrophobia. Having this conditions, anyone who is inside can be considered a slave of his own mind.
* It is because of this that many people (Jews for example) that were on the labour camps didn’t even manage to complain about their living conditions, because they knew they were trapped. Some people even commited suicide because of this; their freedom was taken away along with their dignity . This atrocities can be perfectly compared to slavery, and if not it’s definitely worse.
* 3.- In chapter 8, there are 2 mazes that can be found: the physical and the psychological one.
* The first one can be found clearly all along the chapter; it’s the Buchenwald concentration camp. It’s well known due global history that this was one of the principal camp in the whole holocaust. So this would the first maze in the chapter; the physical space in which Georg Koves is in, one that doesn’t allow him even think in get out of there. He was under constant surveillance, and slept in a very close space with alot of other children; and made a friend that was a prisoner doctor, that felt affection for children that spoke french; and later on he establishes friendship with Georg.
* The second one is the psychological maze that can be found in the chapter, in several moments of it. In the first pages of the chapter, Georg states that he loved the showers of the cap, that were actually in very poor and in bad conditions. Later in the chapter, he is assigned to sleep on a box with quilts above. This is what he though about it: “To begin with, I couldn’t believe my own eyes. Over on the left I could see two rows of regular boxes there too, except the planks were covered by a layer of pink, green, and mauve quilts.” (page 193). This proofs that Georg’s mind has been changed. At the beggining of the novel, he was a kid with normal manners; but now he has been in the maze too much, he finds what is something miserable attractive and comfortable. He was happy because he would sleep in a box with quilts in it.
* So it’s very clear that Mazes were present in the novel, specifically on chapter 8, such as mental and concrete ones. This is a topic that the same Imre Kertész has stated as something relevant in history of humanity, and it’s something worth of a monument in Berlín.
* Labyrinth were sometimes used as a way to punish prisoners, and many of them died inside because they didn’t managed to find the exit.
* The point here is that a maze can be considered many as a prison or a way to be trapped, taking the freedom away, and bringing a claustrophobic feeling. Mazes are even used in many pshycological tests to demostrate the tendence of independence that one has.
* There is also a phenonenom called “mental maze”, which means that the pacient has a limited vision of the world, is trapped in a mental illness to be psychollogically disturbed. An example of that is a case of a father that locked his daugter in the basement of the house for 24 years, in Austria, and the girl in the end needed 1 month of psychological treatment to answer the questions that the police made to her.
* 2.- Just as we saw in the interview with Imre Kertész, there is a comparisson between the labour camps and the labyrinths. Both have very similar functions , not specific ones but according to the message they want to transmit. Labour Camps and mazes have very similiar architecture, they are usually closed spaces with one entrance that was used as an exit too; they where made specially for locking up someone inside so they has solid mechanisms such as walls and paths.
* Both camps and mazes change people, insert fear in them. Both of them lows the self-esteem in prisioners, and increase the claustrophobia. Having this conditions, anyone who is inside can be considered a slave of his own mind.
* It is because of this that many people (Jews for example) that were on the labour camps didn’t even manage to complain about their living conditions, because they knew they were trapped. Some people even commited suicide because of this; their freedom was taken away along with their dignity . This atrocities can be perfectly compared to slavery, and if not it’s definitely worse.
* 3.- In chapter 8, there are 2 mazes that can be found: the physical and the psychological one.
* The first one can be found clearly all along the chapter; it’s the Buchenwald concentration camp. It’s well known due global history that this was one of the principal camp in the whole holocaust. So this would the first maze in the chapter; the physical space in which Georg Koves is in, one that doesn’t allow him even think in get out of there. He was under constant surveillance, and slept in a very close space with alot of other children; and made a friend that was a prisoner doctor, that felt affection for children that spoke french; and later on he establishes friendship with Georg.
* The second one is the psychological maze that can be found in the chapter, in several moments of it. In the first pages of the chapter, Georg states that he loved the showers of the cap, that were actually in very poor and in bad conditions. Later in the chapter, he is assigned to sleep on a box with quilts above. This is what he though about it: “To begin with, I couldn’t believe my own eyes. Over on the left I could see two rows of regular boxes there too, except the planks were covered by a layer of pink, green, and mauve quilts.” (page 193). This proofs that Georg’s mind has been changed. At the beggining of the novel, he was a kid with normal manners; but now he has been in the maze too much, he finds what is something miserable attractive and comfortable. He was happy because he would sleep in a box with quilts in it.
* So it’s very clear that Mazes were present in the novel, specifically on chapter 8, such as mental and concrete ones. This is a topic that the same Imre Kertész has stated as something relevant in history of humanity, and it’s something worth of a monument in Berlín.
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