The Devil's Arithmetic conveys important understandings about what was endured during the Holocaust, and it is able to do so through two very different settings; modern-day New York and 1942 Poland. The main character, Hannah, is a young Jewish girl living in New York. While she has been well-educated on the atrocities of the Holocaust through school and through her family's personal struggles during the time, Hannah is bored by the stories of her past.
However, an odd event during Passover transports Hannah back in time, and she finds herself in Poland in 1942 as Chaya, a young orphan. Even though she is now a young Polish Jew, she retains all of her knowledge and understanding from her life as Hannah. Because of this, Hannah/Chaya is well aware of the dangers that await her community when they are escorted to the camps on Shmuel's wedding day. Hannah may already know of the horrific events that are to come, but the others around her cannot fathom that humans could create so many horrors for other humans, and therefore Chaya's warnings cannot stop the fate that is destined to befall all of those taken to the camps.
Friday, March 7, 2014
How did Chaya's prior knowledge of the future lead her to understand the danger that awaited the group at the shul
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
What is the theme of the chapter Lead?
Primo Levi's complex probing of the Holocaust, including his survival of Auschwitz and pre- and post-war life, is organized around indiv...
-
The statement "Development policy needs to be about poor people, not just poor countries," carries a lot of baggage. Let's dis...
-
"Mistaken Identity" is an amusing anecdote recounted by the famous author Mark Twain about an experience he once had while traveli...
-
Primo Levi's complex probing of the Holocaust, including his survival of Auschwitz and pre- and post-war life, is organized around indiv...
-
De Gouges's Declaration of the Rights of Woman was enormously influential. We can see its influences on early English feminist Mary Woll...
-
As if Hamlet were not obsessed enough with death, his uncovering of the skull of Yorick, the court jester from his youth, really sets him of...
-
In both "Volar" and "A Wall of Fire Rising," the characters are impacted by their environments, and this is indeed refle...
No comments:
Post a Comment