IRB Blog Post #3

For my third independent reading book blog post, I will be writing about theme topics in the book The Boy in the Striped Pajamas. I think so far the main theme in the book is innocence and naivety in Bruno. In this portion of the book, Bruno explores and meets Shmuel on the other side of the fence. Bruno does realize that Shmuel is wearing the same uniform and outfit that he has seen the others on that side of the fence wearing, but Bruno thinks none of it. They exchange names, birthdays, etc. Bruno tells Shmuel how he doesn’t like the life he has on his side of the fence, not knowing that Shmuel’s is many many times worse.  When Shmuel tells his story to Bruno, Bruno relates what Shmuel’s saying to something that happened to him, but still not knowing that Shmuel’s experiences are far worse. An example of this is that Bruno asked Shmuel whether he had any friends, and Shmuel replies by saying there are many boys on his side of the fence. Bruno responds by saying that Shmuel is lucky and complains about how boring it is on his side of the fence because there is no one to play with. Another example that shows innocence in Bruno is when Shmuel tells him that he is from Poland. Bruno says that he doesn’t believe that Poland is as good a country as Germany is. He says that he thinks this because he hears his father saying that Germany is superior. That shows how innocent Bruno is because saying that to a person in Shmuel’s circumstance would really hurt him. A direct quote from the text that can support the theme of innocence and naivety is a quote from when Shmuel is describing how he got to “Out-With”. The quote is, “‘All of us’, said Shmuel, nodding his head. ‘Eleven in total’. Bruno opened his mouth to contradict him again – he didn’t really believe that 11 people could live in the same room together.” This quote shows that Bruno is very innocent and doesn’t realize that there were 11 of them together in the same room, not by choice, but because they were forced to. Those are some examples of the theme topic of innocence and naivety from Bruno.