Liesel Meminger does not live in a world that can be delineated in terms of black and white, unlike the pages of the books to which she is drawn. Growing up in the household of a kind man who tries to act with decency and honor, she learns how to “Heil Hitler” and how to hide a Jew. She discovers a compulsion to acquire books, even before she can read. The multitude of paradoxes within her heart-breaking story continues with every chapter and every page, with Death haunted by humans and Life preserved by scribbles on a dead tree.
Her attitude towards books and writing confounded me, because she stole books rather than food or something that nourishes the body. Yet she does not seem to gain the same pleasure from reading that I or any one of my bibliophile friends experience. She ends her memoir: “I have hated the words and I have loved them, and I hope I have made them right.” To be sure, I have hated some books I’ve read and absolutely fallen in love with others. I have prayed, especially when writing a research paper, that I have used language elegantly and masterfully. But I have never experienced the burning desire to acquire books instead of basic necessities. What possesses this inconsequential girl to value literature so highly?
As Death comes to take away everyone she holds dear, he remarks, “She was still clutching the book. She was holding on to the words who had saved her life.” With that, a stunningly simple truth emerges from the rubble of bombarded homes: The words have become human to Liesel. Watching Death visit her town repeatedly, she clings to the written word as something of more permanence than humans. Words live on where bodies break down and decay. Another paradox – Death finds her own words that she composed down in the basement where she survived desolation and keeps them well after he comes for her. Her own words live on through the curiosity of a lifeless being.
Even this story itself, ostensibly, embodies this survival of the written word as readers in 2016 can read about a young girl from the 1940s. She may not be real, but her story is. Whenever I find a truly engaging novel, the characters take on an authenticity that I can never foretell. They jump off the page and pierce my heart with their tragedies and elate my soul with their triumphs.
Words hold an incredible, incomprehensible power to transform your life. Just like Liesel, every human experiences a paradox of truth, fear, love and sorrow. Trying to express those feelings and thoughts often feels like trying to glimpse the side of the road through blinders. In that moment, the writings of another person provide clarity and perspective on what seem to be suffocating circumstances. I believe that Liesel craves books because she senses this freedom and transforming potential.
