Topics Of War And Nationalism: "The Boy In The Striped Pyjamas" By John Boyne

History is written in blood. Wars are formed from human nature, a nature that requires ruthless acts to assert dominance. This unconscious action is perpetually pointless and inevitably achieves nothing. These acts of pure violence born from the hearts and minds of humans have been documented through literature, whether fictional or genuine. ‘The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas’ is one of these particularly moving fictional works, that explores the causes, effects and themes displayed through World War Two. Boyne’s ‘The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas’ investigates how nationalism was linked to the brutality directed by the Nazi party towards, not only the Jews, but their own people too. More so, it emphasises how boundaries established in war are futile. The subject of criticism of the novel is the Nazi Party, a past, political group of Germany that came to power by creating a growing sense of nationalism in the German people. It is this constructed pride of country that allowed for these brutal acts of war. Boyne’s literature works to establish the ‘us vs them’ divide that was shaped by the German nationalistic views. Furthermore, Boyne depicts how the Nazis, in particular, those higher up in the hierarchy, justified the slaughter of Jews by claiming that it was ‘cleansing’ the world of the less superior. Boyne depicts this nationalistic view, that divided the Jewish from the Germans, when Bruno asks who the people on the other side of that fence is, to which he is told “Ah, those people,” said Father, nodding his head and smiling slightly. “Those people…well, they’re not people at all, Bruno”. Through this quote, Boyne introduces the division between Nazis and the Jews, the division being based on The Commandant’s, ‘The Fury’s’ and the Nazi Party’s belief of a superior race. It is this separation due to a nationalism belief that caused the death of Bruno, possibly the most tragic part of the novel. However, it is not just the death that represents brutality but the effect the death has on readers of the novel. Readers are struck by the sudden demise of the novel’s protagonist, but care little for the death of a small Jewish boy, of a family of Jews, of a nation. Joseph Stalin, one of the most memorable tyrants of Russia, supposedly said, “a single death is a tragedy, a million deaths are a statistic”. Herein lies the true ruthlessness of the novel - a man, no different to ones’ father or brother, is accepting of killing ‘the other’ but it is only when his own child challenges the division of these Jews and these Germans, and winds up meeting the same fate as ‘the other’, does any effect register.

The brutality of the novel does not lie simply in the killing, but rather how the killing was justified through nationalism. Yet, Boyne’s ‘The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas’ is not the only piece of war literature where we see the nationalistic views forcing brutality upon countless people. A. E. Housman’s ‘Here dead we lie’ poem tells of the true fatality that soldiers, on both sides of the war, faced. Housman states that “Here dead we [soldiers] lie because we did not choose to shame the land from which we sprang”. These words illustrate how nationalism, impressed upon by leaders, who said that to fight for this country is just, lead to the deaths of millions. But those same men in power could not be blamed for the soldiers’ deaths because those soldiers died for their country. Additionally, Housman’s direct wording and approach of the poem symbolises the sacrifice of these men, they were told what to do and perished at a young age. The true brutality of war is not in the deaths but in the flawed cause, where men were slaughtered at too young an age because they were told this fighting, this senseless murder, was justifiable because of the land where they came from. Furthermore, ‘The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas’ exposes the idea of how boundaries made in war achieve nothing but can destroy much. Boyne uses ‘the fence’ surrounding ‘Out-With’ as a major symbol in illustrating the futility of war. The novel follows the friendship between two boys, who are no different from each other, but separated by a fence. It is not just this physical fence but also the misleading, verbal boundaries created to stop an ignorant nine-year-old discovering the truth, that leads to a tragic and futile death. A pointless death that not even the fence could alter or prevent like so many “fences” located around the world. Boyne elucidates to what is achieved once these barriers, boundaries and fences are broken down when, “Bruno found that he was still holding Shmuel’s hand in his own and nothing in the world would have persuaded him to let it go”. Boyne uses this sentence to signify the unity that was formed between the two boys when they were no longer separated by the “Out-With’ fence. Boundaries that were formed in the war to alienated ‘the Other’ changed nothing but lead to the deaths of millions. Bruno was never meant to be dealt the same fate as the Jewish but it is because of the fence that he did. It is because of the separation of nations that one’s own people died and it is because of these deaths that no matter what was gained, nothing could outweigh the pointlessness of all the loses.

Moreover, Wilfred Owen, identified to be one of the best war poets, shares similar views to Boyne with regards to the futility of boundaries. Wilfred Owen’s poem ‘Futility’ describes the story of a dying soldier and how, the men around him, try to revive him by moving his body into the sun - the sun that “Always it woke him, even in France”. Wilfred Owen emphasises that the sun, which knows no boundaries, can’t wake the man once more. Further along in the poem Owen questions, through the perspective of one of the dying man’s mates, “Was it for this the clay grew tall?”. This line expresses the true futility that comes with war. These soldiers grew up only to have their lives taken in an instant, men who should have started a family now lay bleeding in the mud, life draining from them, all for what? To serve their country by trying to massacre men no different to themselves. Wars are fought over the division of people and their ideals, but these boundaries lead to only pain and suffering, only death and sacrifice, and any victory comes at a great cost. No war is ever justly won. The death of many always outweighs the victory of the remaining. The views of some will lead to brutality and the creation of boundaries which ultimately achieve nothing. Nationalism forces a separation between brothers and boundaries divide men who, in an ideal world, would be comrades. It is here that one can infer, due to the human condition, no war is without brutality, without futility. “There never was a good war, or a bad peace” - Benjamin Franklin