Summary Of The Cellist Of Sarajevo

In Steven Galloway’s The Cellist of Sarajevo, he depicts four civilians in Sarajevo, which is being under siege by the men on the hills. They would terrorize the citizens by sniping random pedestrians or sending mortars to bread shop, resulting in twenty-two people’s death. A cellist saw the attack and deciding to play Albinoni’s Adagio for twenty-two days, to commemorate the innocent people that had died. Another character Galloway presents is Arrow. A female sniper who picks off the men on the hills one by one. Her only goal was to kill the men on the hills, until a solider persuader her to do something that is equally as important as her goal. She was to protect the Cellist from an enemy sniper, she must allow the Cellist to play for twenty-two

It helps advance the story because at first people thought of his act as pure stupidity, but then they soon realize it’s more than that. Another symbol is the gray sky. Throughout the story, the city of Sarajevo had always been covered with gray skies, which represents death and hopelessness. The symbols reveal what each character in the story feels. All four characters in the story have struggled immensely because of the war, and so they wake up with gray skies everyday because they are surrounded by death and misery. But, near the end of the book, Kenan describes how he was able to see the sun through the gray skies when he heard the cellist. This symbols also help characterize the story’s setting by revealing the dark and frightening occurrences in war. Another symbol that is briefly mentioned is cigarettes. They symbolized wealth, cigarettes are very hard to come by and can be quite costly. It is said that some of Kenan’s neighbors have spent all of their savings to buy cigarettes, which can only provide temporary happiness. In another occurrence, when Kenan was getting water, he says a wealthy dressed man smoking the cigarette. Only smoking half of it he drops and soon, a woman picks it up and keeps it. This emphasize the wealth gap in Sarajevo, one is either making major profit from the war or one is dirt poor. Moreover, the symbols emphasize the fearsome environment the people are