Review of "The boy in striped pajamas"

The boy in striped pajamas, written by John Boyne, told how holocaust looked like from the point of view of a nine-year-old boy called Bruno. Bruno was the son of a Nazi officer but knew nothing about what his father was doing.  He made friends with a Jewish boy Shumel when his family moved to somewhere really close to the concentration camp. As a little boy, he misunderstood lots of the truth and let some of the evilness seem not serious in the book. The book used a boy’s naïve view to mock the evilness and show the truth to the audience. The book finally ended with the two young boys’ death and the SS officer’s crying. 

   When I read the book, my very first thinking is the book is ridiculous because the author seemed to make all the crimes unserious. Even though at the end of the novel, the SS officer seemed to realize his guilt, it was not enough at all. Rabbi Benjamin Blech described the book as "not just a lie and not just a fairytale, but a profanation". Despite the book's intentions, he argues, the plot is highly improbable and gives credence to the defence that people did not, and could not, know what was happening within the death camps.

    However, when I read it again last year, I found it irony, especially the ending. Like Kathryn Hughes said, "Bruno's innocence comes to stand for the willful refusal of all adult Germans to see what was going on under their noses". From a little boy’s sight, the world should be peaceful, colorful and beautiful. He may also be quite proud of his father since his father is his hero. Unfortunately, those crimes happened in front of Bruno's eyes. He cannot understand the truth as well as some really bad treatments his friend got. What happened in the world seemed like a game for the little boy but not for those who involved. The boy’s death told us who was killed in the holocaust --- the innocent people. Just like Bruno, those Jewish people who were killed were innocent. They did nothing wrong but got the terrible treatment and most of them even did not know they ere going to be killed when Thanatos coming.  In my opinion, the author was trying to blame all the people who saw the crime happened not only the Nazi party. Even a 9-year-old boy can see the crime and was involved in the crime, how can those adults and the whole society ignore the evilness? Boyne tried to blame everyone and the end of the book showed the regret of the Bruno’s father. But as we all know, the regret won’t help to solve anything.