PowToon Video

This is my PowToon on The Book Thief .


I started my PowToon with the picture of the novel The Book Thief, a crumbled paper for the background, and two men because I both wanted people to see the book that was going to be address and understand that it is something worth talking about. I wanted the people who saw the PowToon to have something different stuck in their head instead of just pictures and words floating around. The two men gives the viewers something constant to latch onto in the video. I made the two men have a short conversation about the book to caught people attention with the melodramatic act happing. Next I put a picture of Death up and had one of the men, someone who has presumably read the book, describe that the book is in Death's point of view to another man, someone who has not read the book. The following picture of a blue eyed, blonde was made to represent Liesel both when she first entered Himmel Street, and when she has to leave it when it gets bombed. The little men in the corner keep a consent explanation of the pictures by telling the basics of the story. The next picture is made to represent the book that the novel The Book Thief is based on. The book that Liesel wrote about herself late at night before her home was bombed. The PowToon then moves on to a picture of a train put there to represent the train Liesel's little brother died on before they made it to Himmel Street. The worlds "The sky was white that day" is put there because the day Liesel's brother died Death looked to the sky and I was pure white. After that is a picture of a small street made to be Himmel Street, the street that Liesel lived on. The next picture is of Jewish man meant to be Max, the Jew that Liesel and her family take in and hide. The words beside the picture "Max the Jewish fist fighter" is there because in the book Max fights Hitler in the basement. The next pictured shown is of Himmel Street again but the words beside the picture are "The Sky is red that day." They are there because this is last time death sees Liesel before she dies, and her street has been blown to bits. I end the PowToon with the two men finishing their conversation next to the cover again. I did this so that viewers will get the picture of the cover stuck in their head and remember the PowToon.

Zusak's Style

Markus Zusak's style pulls the reader in and attaches them to the story. Zusak includes extremely well written foreshadowing, spoiling of the plot, and characters in his writing style. There are two types of point of view that Zusak’s uses. He utilizes both the first person point of view and the third-person limited point of view. He uses Death as the narrator for this story giving the reader a third-person limited on the story about Liesel, and a first-person point of view when Death talks directly to the reader about himself. The author uses death to both foreshadow future events and spoil future happenings. His characters are easy to attach to and they are realistic in a way that fascinates me. A good example of Zusak’s style is located on page 241 “***A SMALL ANNOUNCEMENT *** ABOUT RUDY STEINER He didn’t deserve to die the way he did.” This shows Zusak’s writing style because it tells us that Rudy dies: spoiling the end, it foreshadows the death that is to come, and it shows us the character that is Death. It tells us that Death does not care about keeping the reader guessing. As he says “I don’t have much interest in building mystery. Mystery bores me. It chores me. I know what happens and so do you” (243). Death is one of the more unique characters within this novel and Zusak writes him beautifully. Death is portrayed as just another human in this novel with feelings and wants, but he still stays a mystery to us. The plot spoiling aspect of Zusak’s writing puts the reader in a state of mind that says “Now I know the end I can just enjoy the book,” while surprising the reader in the end anyway. The point of view of death, in both the first person and third-person limited point of view, also gives the reader a new way to, not only look at World War II, but also everyday activities and objects. The style Zusak uses keeps the readers attention and lets the reader melt into the story.

"I am haunted by humans"

Death never has a day off; he cannot turn around and ignore his job. Death deals with humans all the time. His job, essentially, is to take the souls of toddlers, children, teenagers, and adults to the afterlife. Unlike most assume he is actually affected by the death of humans of course it is not the death that he cannot stand it those left behind as Death himself tells us on page 5. Sometimes, as in the case of the book thief, he will find a story just lying around and he will pick it up, keep it with him, and revisit the story later. Humans are haunted by death. It is a fact that everybody knows, and everybody hates. We fear death, avoid it, but it always there right around corner the lurking as we like to think, waiting for us. What happens if we are not the only ones being haunted in this hated relationship? What if Death is just as haunted by humans as we are by him? Unlike us humans he can turn around and ignore us. He has to take our souls every day for forever. The most important text with in this novel explains this perfectly "***A LAST NOTE FROM YOUR NARRATOR*** I am haunted by humans" (550). This is most important because it explains the reason why the book is written in Death's point of view. He tells us in the beginning of the book "first the color. Then the humans. That's usually how I see thing. Or at least, how I try" (3). Death tries to ignore the humans left alive, but sometimes it is inevitable. That is why this book is in Death's point of view. He saw the book thief three times, and the last time he noticed a book. A book written by a little German girl in her basement late at night. He picks up this story and shares it with us the day after Liesel dies. Death's vacation, or distraction, is in the colors of the sky, but sometimes the distraction does not help him.

The Book Thief

The story is told by death about a little German girl named Liesel Meminger, the book thief herself. When Death first meets Liesel she is nine years old on her way to a foster home with her mother and little brother. Her little brother died coughing in a train car just before Liesel woke up. Liesel steals her first book at her brother's funeral spotting it in the snow. The tile: "The Grave Digger's Handbook," Liesel reading ability: 0. Liesel reaches her new home, with a new life, with a new papa and mama on Himmel Street . She has nightmares of her brother’s death and becomes attached to her new father almost instantly. One day he finds the stolen book, and asks her if she knows how to read. When he finds out she doesn’t he teaches her even though he isn’t the beat reader or writer. The longer Liesel lives at her new home the more comfortable she is and soon she becomes friends with the boy next door named Rudy. The next book she ends up stealing is called “The Shoulder Shrug.” Liesel saves this book from be burned by Nazis a second time. This time she doesn’t get away clean though, and she knows it. The only thing is she’s never turned in. Liesel knows the mayor's wife saw her take the book, but she finds out later that the mayor's wife doesn't plan on turning her in. The mayor's wife invites Liesel into her house so she can read books in the library. Liesel doesn't steel anymore books, until later. During her time on Himmel Street a Jew named Max comes to live with Liesel and her family. Liesel grows close to Max, almost as close as she is with her papa. When the mayor's wife fires Liesel's mother, and offers Liesel the book she was currently reading Liesel refuses it and leaves angrily lashing out. A few days later Liesel goes with Rudy to steal "The Whistler" the offered book. Liesel steals two books and takes an offered one from the mayor and his wife. Along the way Max has to leave because Hans, Liesel's father helps an old Jewish man as he walks by starving. We see Max two times after he leaves one of these times he is paraded through Himmel Street where Liesel walks with hum. Later in the story Liesel decides to write her own book about her life, and the one night when she's in the basement writing the bombs hit. They kill her mama, papa, Rudy and his family, and everyone else on the street. She is dug out sometime after the bombs explode and above ground where she finds all the bodies of those she loves she drops her book. The third time death meets Liesel is in this very spot with a red sky. This very book is picked up and thrown away to be saved by death. Liesel is with Rudy's Dad, who came back from being drafted to find his whole family gone, when we see Max again. Death reveals at the end of the book that "the book thief died only yesterday" and that "there's a multitude of stories... that I allow to distract me as I work, just as the colors do...The Book Thief is one such story." (549).

My Feeligns On Death

Death. Nobody likes talking about it because it scares us, and people, as human beings, tend to avoid what scares them. We lock our fears away in a far way closet set in the furthest reaches of our minds. Everybody fears different things, from spiders and snakes to the ocean and being left alone, but everybody, no matter what they say, fears death. This is weird because death surrounds us every day of our lives. We see it all the time, and know we cannot escape it so why do we fear it? We fear it because we do not understand it. Yea people understand what death is and why it happens, but what would you do if you had a look through the eyes of death? What if death is not just a thing, but more human then we think? "The Book Thief" gives us that type of outlook. Death's job is to take the souls of the dead to the afterlife everyday, so what happens when there is a war? He has to work double time. Death works every hour of every day of every year, and war means that he has to work harder. We know death and war go hand in hand, but what if they are not friends what if war is death's boss? Death himself tells us his point of view on war "They say that war is death's best friend, but I must offer you a different point of view on that one. To me war is like the new boss who expects the impossible" (309). World War II was a very busy time for death because he had to travel from one battle ground to the next and stop in bombed towns, and concentration camps on his way. Before I read "The Book Thief" I feared death, just like every other human, and I avoided it as best I could. After reading the book I can not say I no longer fear death, it would be a lie, but I have come to pity him.