The Boy In The Striped Pyjamas Essay

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The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas by John Boyne is described as ‘a fable’ on the title page of the book, presumably to explain the unrealistic aspects of the story. This categorisation implies that Bruno's story is a work of fiction, serving as a timeless representation of the violence of the Holocaust whilst drawing the readers focus to the moral messages surrounding humanity. Most of the moral messages or lessons explored in the book encourage the reader to question man’s capacity for inhumanity. More specifically it looks at how the mistreatment and prejudice against any group of people is unnatural and unjust. Additionally, revealing the way in which children can be influenced by their parents to normalise class and racial hierarchies as…show more content…
The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas is a self-proclaimed fable, as Boyne did not write it with the intention of being historically accurate but to be a moral story or teaching about humanity. Boyne favours the literary technique that Mikhail Bakhtin, the Russian formalist critic, referred to as “defamiliarisation”, which Boyne used to adopt the more or less innocent perspectives. This technique allows Bruno’s innocent perspective to expose the assumptions of the adults that he interacts with, revealing how even loving parents can influence their children into believing that other religions or races are inferior to them or even subhuman. This is just one of the many moral messages or lessons about humanity that the story encompasses. It shows that the mistreatment and prejudice against any group of people is wrong and unjust; and reveals the process, which begins at home with the parent’s teachings, that normalises class and racial hierarchies as well as prejudice, hatred and even violence against other different social groups. Overall it serves as a reminder of man’s capacity for inhumanity, through the
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