The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas

For the film, see The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas (film).

The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas

Author	John Boyne
Language	English
Genre	Children, historical, Tragicomedy, Fable
Publisher	David Fickling Books
Publication date	5 January 2006
Publication place	Republic of Ireland
Media type	Print (Hardcover)
Pages	216 pp
ISBN	ISBN 0-385-60940-X
OCLC	62132588

The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas (ISBN 0-385-60940-X) is a 2006 novel about Germans and the Holocaust, from the point of view of a young boy, written by Irish novelist John Boyne. Unlike the months of planning Boyne devoted to his other books, he said that he wrote the entire first draft of The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas in two and a half days, barely sleeping until he got to the end. To date, the novel has sold more than 5 million copies around the world, and was published as The Boy in the Striped Pajamas in the United States. In both 2007 and 2008 it was the best selling book of the year in Spain. It has also reached number one on the New York Times bestseller list, as well as in the UK, Ireland, Australia and many other countries.

Plot summary

Bruno is a nine-year old boy who is growing up in Berlin during World War II. He lives in a 5-story house with his parents, his 12 year old sister Gretel and a few servants. His father has a very important job and they have just been visited by a man called the 'Fury' (aka Hitler). After he visits, his father gets a new uniform and his title is changed to 'Commandant', and to Bruno's displeasure the family have to move away to a place called Out-With (Auschwitz).

When Bruno gets there he is immediately homesick after leaving behind his home, grandparents, and his three best friends. He is unhappy with his new home. It only has three floors and there are always soldiers coming in and out of the house. Bruno is lonely and has no one to talk to or play with. However, one day while Bruno is looking out of his window he notices a bunch of people all wearing the same striped pyjamas. As he is a curious child, Bruno asks his father who these people are, but gets a rather unusual answer. His father tells him that these people are not people at all.

Bruno is not allowed to explore the house or its surroundings. Due to sheer curiosity and boredom, he is forced to explore. He spots a dot in the distance on the other side of the fence and as he gets closer, he sees it's a boy. Excited by the prospect of a friend, Bruno introduces himself. The Jewish boy's name is Shmuel. Almost every day, they meet at the same spot and talk. Eventually, for a variety of reasons, Bruno decides to climb under the fence and explore Shmuel's world.

The story ends with Bruno about to go back to Berlin with his mother and sister on the orders of his father. As a final adventure, he agrees to dress in a set of striped pyjamas and goes in under the fence to help Shmuel find his father, who went missing in the camp. The boys are unable to find him, and just as it starts to rain and get dark, Bruno decides he would like to go home, but they are rounded up in a crowd of people by the Nazi guards who start them on a march. Neither boy knows where this march will lead. However, they are soon crowded into a gas chamber, which Bruno assumes is a place to keep them dry from the rain until it stops. The author leaves the story with Bruno pondering, yet unafraid, in the dark holding hands with Shmuel. "...Despite the chaos that followed, Bruno found that he was still holding Shmuel's hand in his own and nothing in the world would have persuaded him to let go".

In an epilogue, Bruno's family spend several months at their home trying to find Bruno, before his mother and Gretel return to Berlin, only to discover he is not there as they had expected. A year afterwards, his father returns to the spot that the soldiers found Bruno's clothes (the same spot Bruno spent the last year of his life) and, after a brief inspection, discovers that the fence is not properly attached at the base and can form a gap big enough for a boy of Bruno's size to fit through. Using this information, his father eventually pieces together that they gassed Bruno to death. Several months later, the Red Army arrives to liberate the camp and orders Bruno's father to go with them. He goes without complaint, because "he didn't really mind what they did to him anymore".

Controversy

The book is a novel: it is not historical fiction. The very premise of the book - that there would be a child of Shmuel's age - is, according to critics, an unacceptable fabrication that does not reflect the reality of life in the camps.

Rabbi Benjamin Blech condemned it: "This book is not just a lie and not just a fairytale, but a profanation." His chief complaint is that it supports the idea that ordinary people were unaware of the horrors of the Nazis' mass extermination of Jews. He argues that everyone for miles around could smell the stench of death and expresses doubt that the 9-year-old son of a Nazi official could be unaware of what a Jew is (or whether he himself is one).

He writes, "Note to the reader: There were no nine-year-old Jewish boys in Auschwitz -- the Nazis immediately gassed those not old enough to work. Also, the Auschwitz death camp was surrounded by electric fences, making any attempts to crawl in through a hole impossible.". Such alleged falsification of history has important consequences, say Boyne's critics, for the way that the victims of the Holocaust might be remembered and commemorated, thus reviving arguments that were previously aired about Steven Spielberg's Schindler's List and the manner in which that film sanitised and falsified aspects of the concentration camp experience too.