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A review by erine
Caging Skies by Christine Leunens
4.0
I read this over several days in which I also watched the movie - JoJo Rabbit. While the twisting humor and shadowy terror were similar in both formats, the book takes the story too far (as in too far past the point when it should have ended) and the movie takes the story too far (too far into the absurd). And yet neither of them were really too far, because what is “too far” when you’re talking extremism, fanaticism, selfish disdain for the humanity of others, etc.
A difficult read that warps simple notions of good and evil in a very dark and discouraging way. The movie left me feeling more hope in the midst of tragedy, but the book dragged me down and held me under. This portrayal of a narcissistic young man living in Austria during WWII was in many ways more disheartening than reading about the many ghettos and concentration camps. The tepid bravery of Johannes’ parents was not enough to overcome their son’s speedy embrace of Naziism, nor the icky feeling of Johannes’ doing the right thing only because it happened to serve his own ends, and more often doing the wrong thing in order to serve his own desires.
Despite the utterly depressing tone barely leavened with a sense of humor and biting criticism, it was a unique portrayal of the intersection of reality and madness.
Notes while reading:
Reading this gives me chills. It paints the lure of white supremacy, including the idea that you are unique and valuable to the race war, even if no one else values you. Shivery, indeed:
“We learned new, frightening facts. Life was a constant warfare, a struggle of each race against the others for territory, food and supremacy. Our race, the purest, didn’t have enough land—many of our race were living in exile. Other races were having more children than we were, and were mixing in with our race to weaken us. We were in great danger, but the Führer had trust in us, the children; we were his future. How surprised I was to think that the Führer I saw at Heldenplatz, cheered by masses, the giant on billboards all over Vienna, who even spoke on the wireless, needed someone little like me. Before then, I’d never felt indispensable; rather I’d felt like a child, something akin to an inferior form of an adult, a defect only time and patience could heal.”
Phew. Okay. Parts are painful, but then there’s this:
“Nothing’s as necessary to existence as diversity. You need different races, languages, ideas, not only for their own sake, but so you can know who you are! In your ideal world, who are you? Who? You don’t know! You look so much like everything around you, you disappear like a green lizard on a green tree.”
I don’t know that I ever heard before that Kristallnacht began because of a rumor that a Jew had killed a German embassy official. Smacks a little like an American lynching, in which any excuse is taken for violence against an imagined enemy.
“Feelings were mankind’s most dangerous enemy. They above all were what must be killed if we were to make ourselves a better people.” They are making cybermen: erasing all feeling... to flip that on its head, how can we as a society encourage feeling? Encourage empathy?
I am at the point where Johannes’ father returns from questioning, believing he has been denounced by his son. How terrifying and sickening to be so afraid of your own child. But children are so inherently inconsistent, living with such a limited understanding of the world. How could parents not be afraid?
“If I could have stopped time I would have, but time is the greatest thief of all: It steals everything in the end, truth and lie.”
A difficult read that warps simple notions of good and evil in a very dark and discouraging way. The movie left me feeling more hope in the midst of tragedy, but the book dragged me down and held me under. This portrayal of a narcissistic young man living in Austria during WWII was in many ways more disheartening than reading about the many ghettos and concentration camps. The tepid bravery of Johannes’ parents was not enough to overcome their son’s speedy embrace of Naziism, nor the icky feeling of Johannes’ doing the right thing only because it happened to serve his own ends, and more often doing the wrong thing in order to serve his own desires.
Despite the utterly depressing tone barely leavened with a sense of humor and biting criticism, it was a unique portrayal of the intersection of reality and madness.
Notes while reading:
Reading this gives me chills. It paints the lure of white supremacy, including the idea that you are unique and valuable to the race war, even if no one else values you. Shivery, indeed:
“We learned new, frightening facts. Life was a constant warfare, a struggle of each race against the others for territory, food and supremacy. Our race, the purest, didn’t have enough land—many of our race were living in exile. Other races were having more children than we were, and were mixing in with our race to weaken us. We were in great danger, but the Führer had trust in us, the children; we were his future. How surprised I was to think that the Führer I saw at Heldenplatz, cheered by masses, the giant on billboards all over Vienna, who even spoke on the wireless, needed someone little like me. Before then, I’d never felt indispensable; rather I’d felt like a child, something akin to an inferior form of an adult, a defect only time and patience could heal.”
Phew. Okay. Parts are painful, but then there’s this:
“Nothing’s as necessary to existence as diversity. You need different races, languages, ideas, not only for their own sake, but so you can know who you are! In your ideal world, who are you? Who? You don’t know! You look so much like everything around you, you disappear like a green lizard on a green tree.”
I don’t know that I ever heard before that Kristallnacht began because of a rumor that a Jew had killed a German embassy official. Smacks a little like an American lynching, in which any excuse is taken for violence against an imagined enemy.
“Feelings were mankind’s most dangerous enemy. They above all were what must be killed if we were to make ourselves a better people.” They are making cybermen: erasing all feeling... to flip that on its head, how can we as a society encourage feeling? Encourage empathy?
I am at the point where Johannes’ father returns from questioning, believing he has been denounced by his son. How terrifying and sickening to be so afraid of your own child. But children are so inherently inconsistent, living with such a limited understanding of the world. How could parents not be afraid?
“If I could have stopped time I would have, but time is the greatest thief of all: It steals everything in the end, truth and lie.”