The Boy Who Dared: Week of 3/31/13

*Spoiler Alert*
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Describe a character that you would like to meet (which doesn’t mean that you
think you would like the character, but that you think the character would be
interesting). List 4 questions that you would ask.

Evaluate whether the main character would be worthy of your friendship

Quote a passage & respond to it. How did it make you feel?

A character from The Boy Who Dared that I would like to meet would be none other than Helmuth Hübener. The reason for this is that to me he seems like a truly great person. The type of person that you could only meet once in life and never see again, yet unknowingly they completely alter your being for the better. If I were to meet Helmuth I would like to ask him:

          

          *What truly inspired to make these pamphlets, besides the deceit from your own country?

          *Where you ever scared of the idea of being caught?

          *If you could change anything about what you did in your life, what would it be?

          *Do you think that possibly the fact that your stepfather was a Rottenführer somehow influenced

            you?

When thinking about the fact that if Helmuth Hübener would be worthy of my friendship, I find myself flipping the question. Would I be worthy of his friendship? Throughout the entire story, Helmuth is a symbol of bravery and freedom. He believed in finding the truth no matter how terrible it seemed. In my opinion this surpasses anything I could have ever done. Helmuth repeatedly works to protect his friends and family. I believe that if I were to meet The Boy Who Dared he would more than worthy of my friendship.

My favorite passage from the book would have to be the ending, which is truly amazing:
"Helmuth walks without stumbling, down the long corridor, outside into the courtyard. He draws in the crisp night air. It feels good. It smells like Mutti's sheets on wash day. 

Above the tall redbrick execution shed, between the leafless tree branches, the moon is full, opalescent, and he remembers a night long ago:

          Mutti tucking them in, 

          three brothers, 

          three dark heads nestled against white pillows,

          white moonlight shimmering the walls,

          and Helmuth is floating."

This piece from the book is when Helmuth is about to be executed. This passage simply played and toyed with my emotions, reason being that Helmuth is about to face death yet instead of describing some gruesome act, Bartoletti takes you back to Helmuth's childhood. When he was Helmuth was younger whenever he thought of heaven he always felt like he was floating, almost as if something was pulling him up towards heaven. I think of myself as a sensitive person, so when I made the connection at the end about Helmuth floating, I was not able to contain my emotions. I felt anger at the fact that an eighteen year old boy who was simply trying to spread the truth about the lies his government fed the population, horrible. For daring to stand up for what was right an innocent life was taken, and that goes for tens of millions of people during the time period. After reading the book I was almost in a state of mourning simply for the reason that I have always been interested WWII. The idea that people could do this and call it the correct thing to do, it is absolutely wretched and heartbreaking, the book changes your outlook on humanity, both the dark, light, and gray.

Helmuth Hübener,
The Boy Who Dared