Emil & Karl Blog #4

     For this blog, I want to compare two very different characters, from two very different books, to see their similarities from living through the times of the Holocaust. I want to compare Karl, the protagonist from the book Emil & Karl, and Peter, the protagonist in the book Annexed. Karl and Peter are both children living sometime during the Holocaust. Karl however, is not a Jew. A big trait that the two boys have in common is their independence. Throughout the stories both boys face much tragedy in their lives and overcome them abnormally quickly. I think it was so quick due to the circumstances of fear and the instinct to keep ones self alive. Soon enough, the boys are on their own and fending for themselves. Karl is leading Emil around to save them from being captured, and Peter is bargaining and being sneaky in order to stay alive in Auschwitz. Their motivations in everything they do is to stay alive. It's a natural instinct in each of these boys and without it they would not have made it even as far as they had. I think another intention which is not ever exactly said, is to stay alive in honor of their families. Both of the boys are the last left in their families and don't really have any reason why they should stay alive. So my question was, why did they still fend for their lives? I think they wanted to be a reminder one day, to people all over the world, of what horrors occurred during the Holocaust, in and out of the Nazis' hands. During the story, a conflict faced by both boys is not having a safe place to live. From the beginning of the Holocaust no person could ever be truly safe. Peter has the annex, but when in it, they can't be fully secure. This is very similar in Emil and Karl. The two boys can hide in a cellar, but they won't ever be fully secure when danger is right above their heads. As these comparisons are showing, every body's Holocaust experiences were different, yet remarkably similar.