The Importance Of Life In The Book Thief

“You are going to die.” The prologue of The Book Thief, by Markus Zusak, makes this fact very clear to readers. Despite knowing this however, everyone chooses to ignore that and continue living their lives because no matter how many bad things happen to you, life goes on.The characters in The Book Thief act the exact same way. They always seem to have to go through the worst case scenarios, however they always find a way to bounce back from their tragedies and move on. For these reasons, the main theme of The Book Thief is ‘life goes on’.

The beginning of The Book Thief established the theme of life continuing. First, Liesel moves to Himmel street- translating to ‘Heaven Street’. After recently witnessing her brother’s death, that might’ve been exactly what Liesel needed to bounce back from her grief. Shortly after getting settled in, Liesel meets a boy named Rudy, and they become quite close. Moving to a new place and not knowing anyone is quite a harsh thing to have to go through, so finally having someone to talk to and hang out with probably helped Liesel out quite a bit. For a while, Liesel struggled in school-

No matter how many hardships the characters have had to go through, they still continue on with their lives, knowing that something pleasant must be coming up. Liesel ends up having to move somewhere new where she doesn’t know anyone, however within the first day she’s already met her new parents and made a friend. Max moves into the Hubermann’s household, but ends up having to stay in the basement due to being Jewish, not enabling him to ever take a glance at the outside. Liesel acknowledges this and starts telling him about the weather, much to Max’s excitement. Bombs strike Himmel and Liesel ends up losing everyone she loves, she reminisces however, and moves away, starting anew. When something terrible happens, life will soon hand you a treat and you’ll be able to move on because life goes