Fatelessness - Chapter 2 Literary Analysis Worksheet

Title of selection: Fatelessness, Chapter 2

Author: Imre Kertész

Genre: Autobiographical Novel

Setting: Budapest 1940s, in Georg's neighbourhood

Historical context: WWII. Persecution of Jews. Air raids in Hungary. Antisemitism.




The author wrote this piece to: (author’s purpose): 
To inform us about the psychological aspect of Georg, after his father left.

The main idea of this piece is: 
Make us (the readers) feel that Georg can't have feelings for another person, as he finds excuses to tell that he has some sort of girlfriend. As he says, it was "just because of the bomb" and nothing else. It reafirms the idea that he doesn't feel emotions like everybody else. He's in transition between being a boy and becoming suddenly, an adult.

The message (or theme) of this selection which the author would like us to “take away” is: 
People's problems can make their "brain" or something, to "turn off" their feelings and emotions. Other message that it may try to deliver is the fact that everyone has different perspectives and observes the situations from his point of view, but this shouldn't be a problem for us.

Characters: (Major)
Protagonist(s): Georg Koves

Antagonist(s): Perhaps the older Steiner daughter, that is against what Georg believes and they discuss. Also, it may be the mother of Georg, as she is trying to get him back, or even, as a symbolic antagonist, we could say it's the Nazi Regime.

Static characters: older Steiner daughter, because she doesn't understand nor changes her way of thinking. Mr. Sütô also would be a good example, as he maintains his promise of providing money and food to the family, no matter what.

Dynamic characters: at the end, the only one that changes what she feels is Annamarie.

Did the author use any special literary devices in this selection such as: personification, metaphor, simile, foreshadowing, suspense, flashback, imagery, irony, humor, poetic sound devices such as rhyme, etc... List and give specific examples:
Most of the literary devices used in here were to compare different situations or make allusions to some abstract ideas through a story. The perfect example of allusion in this case would be the story of a prince and a beggar that looked very similar, and once they changed their places and nobody noticed, being transformed finally into the other one. Georg tells this when they are discussing about being Jewish and all the, apparently, disadvantages it has. He tries to explain that life is almost just luck. "She had somehow been swapped or got mixed up with a child from another family(...) it would now be the other girl who would perceive the difference and of course wear the yellow star" (Page 37). In the quote, we can appreciate clearly that he's putting the Steiner's older daughter into an hypotetical case, so with this, he can demonstrate that the superficiality of people is such, that they wouldn't care as they do now, if she was Jewish (by blood), but has been swapped and raised by a, lets say, Aryan family.

What was the author’s “tone” toward the subject/person/idea he wrote about? 
The author's tone is very excentric. I'd say maybe informal, but it's more than that. It makes the readers feel just as if they are listening to a youngster's mind. 
"This evening too I was with her in the other room to look at the Fleischmanns' ornamental fish, because in truth we have frequently been in the habit of looking at them at other times anyway. This time, of course, that was not quite the only reason for us to got here. We made use of our tongues as well" (Page 33). He is very directly in telling the situation, just as a teenager. He tells what he feels, no matter if that's correct or not.

What “point of view” was this piece told from? List word clues that indicate this. 
As the whole text, from Georg's perspective. It's a quite unusual boy that doesn't appear to be able to feel. He describes what he is passing through with a peculiar tone that makes this novel unique. There's no need to quote, as the entire book is in first person, and the narrator is the same as the protagonist (Georg).

List the conflicts in this selection (internal and/or external):
There's one main external conflict, that is the discussion of Georg with the Steiner's older daughter, about being Jews. She feels uncomfortable because people in the street "hate" her, because she's Jewish, but for Georg it isn't really a problem. 
"Still, there was something in her line of thought that somehow exasperated me; in my opinion, it's all a lot simpler" (Page 36). As we can see, for Georg, this isn't really much of a problem, because he thinks that, if people don't even know her, they can't hate her, right? Also, he adds that it's just something superficial, as he thinks if she wasn't wearing that yellow star band in the arm, they wouldn't even notice she's Jew; therefore, it's just a matter of luck (of borning Jewish, Aryan or Nordic). This is the climax, in which she starts crying, because she realizes that life isn't just a matter of effort and hard work. That if she, unluckily borned being Jewish, will have to bear this for her entire life, and will be discriminated for that with no reason at all.
The internal conflict that may be found in this chapter is the dilemma that Georg has after speaking with his mother. He doesn't really know what to do, but as a good teenager, he'll probably go on what he wants and reject what his mother is telling him.
"I came away feeling rather troubled: naturally I could not allow her to go on supposing that I didn't love her, but then on the other hand I could not take entirely seriously what she had said about the importance of my wishes" (Page 31). This was said after his mother told him that "love is proved by actions, not by words". He is really in a great struggle, as he doesn't know if he should or not continue with his idea.