Patrick’s Comments (group member since Nov 09, 2016)

Patrick’s comments from the The Commendable Coterie group.

In the Stand over man (224) Max is represented as a bird, the is due to his hair looking like feathers. This is known from the quote "his hair is like feathers" (216). Why do you think Zusak chose to represent Max as a bird?

Yes Brianna I think so. The whole story of standover man is about how people throughout Max's life have got in his way and "stood over" him. Max taking Mein kampf and writing over it symbolizes max finally being the "stand over man" by disregarding Hitler's words and standing over them (by writing over them not literally) and writing his own story. This is a way max stands up for himself and shows how he disagrees with Hitler

In response to Brianna I think Zusak made death seem negative in the beginning to try and help us get a better understanding of who is narrator is without outright stating it. An example of distinctive storytelling by Zusak is when death is talking about the start of World War 2 he says "when the war started my work load increased" (73). This proves to a very unique way of stating that many were dying in this world war, the "work load" is the increased influx of dead people death has to "take". For me the word choice he uses is what makes me view this as distinctive storytelling. Anyone else find examples?

I think death refers to passing humans as an eclipse because he is witnessing the light of the human soul being blocked much like when the moon blocks the sun in a solar eclipse. An example of contrast is when death is talking about the fights max used to be in max said "when death captures me he will feel my fist on his face" death says in response to this "such a stupid gallantry"(189) gallantry meaning courage, but death constrasts this by calling him stupid this is also symbolic in how death Sees that humans stupidly think of themselves as immortal But in reality they are very much the opposite.

ALERT:Forgot to mention that the quote used is on pg 72, after all,you are what you cite- Kenny He

This is kind of a short example (but at least I finally posted) Anyway symbolic language is used when Rosa said to Hans, "you smell like cigarettes and kerosene". Cigarettes and kerosene represents the friendship being mended between Liesel and Hans. Also it represents Liesel learning to read as Hans would light a kerosene lamp in the basement, where he taught her to read and where they bonded, which caused him to smell that particular way.