The Boy in the Striped Pajamas

Fiction | Novel | YA | Published in 2006

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Summary

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Chapters 1-5

Chapters 6-10

Chapters 11-15

Chapters 16-20

Character Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Quiz

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Discussion Questions

Symbols & Motifs

Striped Pajamas

The main symbol used throughout Boyne’s novel is that of the “striped pajamas”—grey striped uniforms the Jewish prisoners wear at Auschwitz. Since the novel utilizes a boy’s perspective, the author creates a symbol that combines child’s innocence with the horror of war. Bruno’s first glimpse of the striped pajamas brings up hopes of fun sleepovers, and he envies people who get to wear pajamas all day. The power of the symbol lies in the incongruence between how Bruno reads it and what the uniforms mean in the reality of the story. Boyne uses dramatic irony to show that while Bruno remains unclear as to the real meaning of the uniforms, everyone around him, including his counterpart Shmuel, understands the awful truth behind it. The striped pajamas are a means of erasing individual identities, and this connects to the title of the novel. By the end of the book, readers are not certain whether the boy from the title is Bruno, Shmuel, or a combination for both boys seen as a single entity. In that sense, once Bruno puts on striped pajamas, he becomes just another random boy who dies tragically in the gas chambers of Auschwitz. That is why striped pajamas represent both the horror of war and a child’s lack of understanding of such realities.

Young Boys

Boyne uses the two child characters as symbols of two sides of a terrible division during World War II: Bruno represents the Aryan, German side, and the author reflects this through his superficial understanding of the world, his sheltered upbringing, and his unquestionable admiration for his father and his country. Shmuel, on the other hand, symbolizes the Jewish, Polish side—the innocent victim and the shadow of his counterpart. Boyne’s decision to use boys as both characters and symbols elevates the story to a parable. The author uses the combination of realism and unreality in relation to the boys’ perceptions as a way to signal to the readers the full horror of real-life historical events.

Barbed-Wire Fence

Shortly after Bruno’s arrival in Auschwitz, the barbed-wire fence is described:

There was a huge wire fence that ran along the length of the house and turned in at the top, extending further along in either direction, further than she could possibly see. [...] At the top of the fence enormous bales of barbed wire were tangled in spirals, and Gretel felt an unexpected pain inside her as she looked at the sharp spikes sticking out all the way round it. (55)

The image of the fence is the first indication to the readers that Bruno’s family has arrived at a concentration camp. The author provides a detailed description, using words like “huge,” “high,” and “enormous” to indicate the immense size of its physical presence, but also to imply deeper meanings. The phrases “tangled in spirals” and “sharp spikes” provoke a sense of dread and physical discomfort, which is why Gretel feels a “pain inside her.” Symbolically, the fence represents violent division, an aggressor and a victim, and the loss of freedom. While “telegraph poles” might indicate communication, the bales of barbed wire represent the loss of voice of the Jewish community.

Power and Impotence

Boyne threads the motifs of power and impotence through the novel, positioning them as distinct yet complementary poles that often work through chains of reactions. Hitler’s power to order Bruno’s father to move his family to Auschwitz has its complement in Father’s inability to disobey. Consequentially, Father’s power to dislodge Bruno and his family from Berlin is something Bruno is powerless to stop. Bruno’s ability to move freely through the countryside surrounding the concentration camp finds its counterpart in Shmuel’s prisoner’s impotence.

Moreover, Father is able to engineer Lieutenant Kotler’s removal from his post, and Kotler, as a lower ranking soldier, has no say in the matter. However, he does have the power to kill Pavel with impunity, because in the scheme of things during the Holocaust Jews were “not people at all” (86), as Father puts it. The Germans stripped Jews of any agency, and the ultimate power play happens on the inside of the camp’s barbed-wire fence, where Jews are exterminated by the Nazis with impunity.

Boyne thus creates a leitmotif that serves as a constant reminder of the balancing act between those who have power and those who do not.

Shaving of the Head

Even though it is clear from their first meeting that the boys represent two halves of the same whole, it is only when Father shaves Bruno’s head due to lice infestation that we see just how much alike they are physically. The author utilizes the motif of the shaving of the head as another representation of erasing personal identity traits: Bruno’s hair is one of the things that differentiate his physical appearance from that of the prisoner children. As Father himself shaves Bruno’s head, he opens up the possibility for the “final adventure” to occur, thus sentencing his own child to death. Additionally, the shaving of the head is a ritual performed on all the Jewish prisoners, as a further demonstration of power and a humiliation for people from all lifestyles, reducing them to criminal-like inmates. Boyne employs this motif in the scene with Bruno as another reminder that all divisions are manmade and fueled by ideologies, insecurities, bigotry, and brute force.