The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas: The Exploration of Innocence

“He alone, who owns the youth, gains the future.” Adolf Hitler once remarked during a speech. During the Holocaust, Hitler targeted the youth to support his cause, as they would be the generation to continue his dream of a 1000-year Reich. Hitler was a role-model and an inspiration to the children of Nazi Germany. Although this was true for most of the population, in ‘The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas’ by John Boyne readers meet eight year old Bruno, the son of a high-ranked Nazi soldier stationed in Auschwitz, Germany, who does not recognize Adolf Hitler when he joins his family for dinner. In the story the readers see Bruno is curious about his father’s job and the areas which his parents pronounced, “Out of bounds at all times and no exceptions”. Nonetheless, Bruno chooses to ignore his parents and ventures outside his house. On this exploration he finds something unexpected: a boy behind a fence, a boy in striped pyjamas. Unaware that Shmuel, the Jewish boy on the other side of the fence, will die at the hands of Bruno’s father, they become friends. One theme this story suggests is that people try to protect children from the horrors exposed in the world as they are very impressionable in their youth and easily impacted by trauma, but protecting one’s innocence only deteriorates their maturity.

From the beginning of the novel, John Boyne depicts Bruno as a notably innocent boy. His naivete is first conveyed by him mishearing and subsequently calling Auschwitz, “Out With” and the Führer, “ [the] Fury”. From his misinterpretation of words, we can see how untouched he is about the world around him, and the atrocities it is committing. Throughout the story, Bruno’s parents rarely try to correct him about this, which suggests that they may be trying to shelter him from reality. The fact that his only knowledge of these concentration camps is based of mishearings also suggests that he is solely exposed to his parents’ perspective on this issue, and literally only hears of anti-semitism in his parents’ biased words. Bruno likely makes no sense of these words either.

A scene that supports the idea of innocence deteriorating one’s innocence is seen when in the end of the book Bruno as decides to crawl under the fence and help Shmuel find his father. There is no way to blame Bruno as his request to come over is of good intentions, since neither of them are aware of the truth behind a concentration camp. Shmuel and Bruno find they are cramped into the gas chamber Bruno then grasps on Shmuel’s hand and says, “You’re my best friend Shmuel... My best friend for life.” Despite both of them being in such an undesirable situation, Bruno whispers this to Shmuel showing the extent of his innocence. This passage shows how unclear Bruno was to his extremely tragic end was coming for him, the root cause of this was because his little knowledge of concentration camps and the Nazi rule. This further supports the claim as only Bruno’s parents are to blame since they brought the pain upon themselves by not letting Bruno know about the problems around him.

On the other hand, we can see Shmuel and Bruno’s friendship blossoming, they play games together, learn more about each other, and coincidentally even have the same birthday. However, one day, Shmuel is brought to Bruno’s house to do chore work. When Shmuel is in the kitchen he is seen by Bruno who generously offers him some chicken. Certainly this was an act of kindness, but Shmuel was accused of theft and beaten by Lieutenant Kotler, a young Nazi soldier. Bruno later takes Shmuel’s side and begins to despise Kotler. Bruno doesn’t see this situation the same as Kotler, he sees it from an unbiased point of view. He sees a child being beaten for something he did not do. Whereas Lieutenant Kotler, sees it as a Jewish boy who was given an opportunity too great for him (being able to come out of the camp) and disrespecting it. Unaware of their political differences Shmuel and Bruno’s friendship is stronger than the divides that are put against them and the norm of Germany during 1933 to 1945. This piece shows the benefits that Bruno obtained staying clueless to the fact that it was terribly wrong for them to be friends but since he was not aware of that, he met his best friend.

Though some may argue that only because of Bruno’s innocence he matures the most, since Shmuel and his friendship -a consequence of Bruno’s lack of knowledge- is the way he gained the most sensibility. Bruno learns about Shmuel's culture, traditions and beliefs. He learns about what is like to be Jew, and how kind they really are. The side that debates the belief that Bruno’s understanding of other cultures and respecting them has matured him the most, and that innocence has nothing to do with learning he has about the world, as everyone will eventually do that themselves when they are of the right age. Though this a good point, Bruno does not mature by understanding Shmuel’s culture but in actuality he only learns about it, nothing more.

Innocence can shelter one from what is happening around them, as it shelters Bruno throughout the book. This eventually causes him to lose his life, leading the readers to believe that protecting one is extremely bad since you do not allow them to fully experience the world and it will only come back to bite them.

By Mehak