Sarah's Key Character Analysis

“Yes, the war is over, at last over,but for your father and me, nothing is the same. Nothing will ever be the same” (197). In the novel Sarah’s Key by Tatina De Rosnay. There were a lot of characters who felt like they must atone for the past in Sarah’s Starzynski mysterious life with the help of Julia Jarmond. Some of the characters include: Julia Jarmond the one who made everyone more involved in the finding of Sarah, William Rainsferd who is Sarah’s son and also the last person to Julia’s research, and finally Edouard without him, Julia would not have known where to start.

Julia was willing to let go of her love life in order to discover what happened to Sarah after the round-up. Firstly, Julia was so caught up with everything in Sarah’s

In Julia’s pathway to discovering more about Sarah’s backstory, she met William on the way who was a huge help to her since he is Sarah’s only son. Eventually, William finds out a secret from Julia that destroyed him and left Julia feeling guilty about exposing a well-kept secret, and also himself feeling guilty because he never knew about this side of his mother. In the beginning,William was so frustrated with all of the lies she was telling so he told her to leave. “I 'm going to be very clear. I don 't want to see you again. I don 't want to talk about this again. Please don 't call me” (239). Julia finally drops the topic after coming all this way to see him, But was backfired with secrets which Sarah never told her own family about what had happened in the past. On the other hand, William never knew about his mom’s previous life and how she was a “jew” which was a tremendous deal back then during the holocaust. People got killed for being one and had many ground rules that come along for being a jew. “William Rainsferd looked down at the photograph of the little girl with the yellow star” (236). “The star… he kept shaking his head. The star on her chest…” (238). At first, he thought Julia was telling lies about his dead mother, but soon later, after she pulls out the picture of Sarah he starts to examine it carefully realizing it is his mother. With research, William manages to find out the last pieces towards Julia investigation and also the backstory behind his

Julia was the main reason why Edouard was spilling more about Sarah. First of all, Edouard’s father had been living with this guilt for what had happened to Sarah’s family from when it happened to when he had died. Edouard promised his “ father on his deathbed, that he would not tell my children or his wife” (160). Once, Julia found out who had previously lived in her house, she had to get all noisy and find who this family was and what had happened to them. Edouard had broken a commitment to his father on not telling anyone what had happened to the little girl ”Sarah” which puts Edouard in a lot of guilt since he obeyed his father’s last wishes. Second of all,even though Julia knew she was to discontinue her research she still manages to encourage Edouard to tell her what had happened to Sarah. “ Edouard, don 't you want to know what had happened to Sarah” ( 165 ). Edouard knew Julia would never continuously stop the research until she truly found out what had happened. My last point is, without the help of Edouard, Julia would not have known where to start. With continuous research, the truth manages to fall out with secrets that come along with it. “ somebody with a secret, he had carried within him for years” (157). with the knowledge of knowing where Sarah used to live Julia uses this information to elaborate on her research in order to find her and tell her “ that our family is not what she thinks. I want to explain what happened” (173). and also tell her we