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The Boy In The Striped Pyjamas Essay

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How is Bruno’s innocence revealed in the novel ‘The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas’?
In the novel, ‘The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas’, John Boyne explores the theme of innocence through the young eyes of Bruno, the Commandant’s son. The novel is set in the 1940’s, after World War 2, at the concentration camp of Auschwitz. The naivety of Bruno is revealed all throughout the novel, including through his understanding of the camp, his language interpretations and in the final scene.
Due to Bruno’s ignorance, he has developed his own idea of what “Out-With” is and who the people are inside of it. He describes the people in the camp as being dressed in “striped pyjamas”, but he is unsure why it is them that wear these “striped pyjamas”, “who decided …show more content…

When Bruno and Shmuel are off on there “final adventure” they come to a stage where they are going on a “march”. Bruno’s ignorance leads him to thinking that it is a casual fun march that won’t be long. Boyne creates the scene leading up to death as dark and rainy. The boys are forced into an “air-tight” room. Bruno mistakes this room to be a place to stay to get out of the rain, but really it is a gas chamber. Before the deaths of Bruno and Shmuel, Bruno grabs Shmuel’s hand. This is symbolic as there naivety led to their inseparable friendship between two very different boys. Boyne has shown that Bruno’s innocence ultimately led to his death just like many other children of the Holocaust.
Overall, Boyne’s novel ‘The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas’ demonstrates the lives of innocent young children during the Holocaust, through the main character Bruno. Bruno is completely ignorant to the horrors of the Holocaust and therefore doesn’t understand what the camp is and who everyone is in “striped pyjamas” are. His naivety becomes apparent in his understanding of words and his limited vocabulary. It becomes evident in the last scene that Bruno’s innocence and ignorance led to his

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