Interview with Liesel Essay

News:

Setting: Germany, Europe

Time: World War Two

Characters: Liesel, Reporter

Summary: This is an interview between our correspondent and Liesel Meminger. She is a remarkable teenager who has lots of stories in her life before and post-World War two. The news agency is interviewing her for our head story for “Teen Hero of War” on the newspaper. She is going to share interesting things of life, interests, and problems she had to face.

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Interview Script.

Introduction

Correspondent: Hi Liesel! Nice to meet you

Liesel: Hi, its a pleasure to be reported by you guys.

I have been following your news agency for a long time.

Correspondent: Let’s not waste time and go straight into our questions today, how is that Liesel?

Liesel: Alright, you may begin.

Start of Interview

Correspondent: What is it like being brought to foster parents? How did you learn to adapt?

Liesel: Being brought to foster parents is a very tough thing for me. It is like getting used to strangers has complete different traits compared to yourself.

If you have read my novel, you would know I miss my mother the most. I think the hardest thing of being turned to foster parents is accepting the truth of leaving kin. Sometimes reality is just too cruel for us to accept. Rosa, unlike my mother, is rude and mean for most of the times. After understanding her actions is her expression of her caring, I could finally understand that she isn’t what I first thought. From my perspective, I think that adapting to a new environment is understanding and observing the new place well. Observing and understanding can help you gain more insight about the place you are going to start in for long-term.

Correspondent: Who is the person you thank the most in your life?

Liesel: I am most grateful of my brother. His death is a motivation of the rest of my actions in my story. First of all, the nightmares of his death lead my success of overcoming fear during those hard times. From day to day I improved my ability to overcome the fear of loss and desperation because my brother’s death was a tragedy to me. Second, his death made me think of not giving up, it feels like the world gave me the opportunity to live is is my destiny to keep living on with my brother’s soul in me. The story of my brother’s death, of how Death took his life, is the main motivation of me living on. I wish my brother could be here to see my willing to live on for him, I bet he will be very proud.

Correspondent: If you had a choice, would you leave Germany to a country with no war and live an ordinary life?

Liesel: I think I won’t. I like my life that is full of adventures and stories. I would rather live wonderfully so I have stories to tell people what happened to me, just like your asking me questions about my experiences. I think sharing the stories help people in our society become stronger and greater, other people can learn from my stories and use them in their life is possible. Even though living in an ordinary life would be easier for me to go through, but if you only have such a short time to live, why wouldn’t you want to be adventurous and live a life with no regrets? This is what the war has taught me, I have to experience humanity in different forms, I have to live to be myself.

Correspondent; What was the hardest thing in school?

Liesel: The hardest thing in school for me is learning how to read and interact with other people. Learning to read is a very tough thing, I remembered the teacher hit me just because I cant read. As I recall, the first thing I was able to recite was “The Gravediggers’ Handbook.” That was an achievement for me in reading, but until now I cant understand why the teacher was so tough on me. Another thing that I think is unfair is that the teacher doesn’t see hope in my of reading, so she didn’t even think of telling me to read during the test. After the incident, I finally realize the importance of learning, so this changed my attitude upon studying, we have to learn till will die to be able to adapt to the changing environment. Learning to interact with other kids is also another thing that was tough for me. I didn’t like people laughing at the things I cant do. For example, some kids made me punch them in the face because they laugh at me in the reading after the test. I had learned that we have to adapt to live with other people, but still doesn’t change your perspective on how you treat others.

Correspondent: How do you feel about stealing books?

Liesel: My attitude towards stealing books are quite astonishing for myself at first. My first book and its meaning was very grateful because it was the only memory I have of my original family. I kept on stealing books further on because I wanted to learn how to read. During war times, books are rare to be seen, so stealing a book that is left unguarded makes me learn faster. Let’s use “The Gravediggers’ Handbook” as an example. It is the first book that has a great meaning in my life, and it is also the first book that I can read. I would not consider stealing books as “stealing” I would rather consider them as “enhancing” my own abilities and experiences.

Correspondent: Why do you like to defy the society’s values?

Liesel: I like to defy the society during the war times and before because I had little knowledge about how the society works as whole. Let us take stealing book as an example. I stole books because I didn’t understand why we shouldn’t read them or even burn them, but after understanding it was because of the Nazi party trying to control our minds, I was happy to steal them. I don’t like to be controlled by people and doing things that doesn’t go with my mind. I befriended Max is also an example of me challenging the society’s values. Max is a Jew and we shouldn’t hide him under Nazi rule. I think that defying a society’s values is a change to society, because a value is not always correct, so I kept on doing that because I feel like the people who aren’t matched with the values are being discriminated.

Correspondent: What is your deepest regret?

Liesel: My deepest regret probably is not saying my last words to my brother. I think I had lots of things to tell my brother before his death. I loved him very much and losing him is like an asteroid hitting me, which has a very great impact. I regret telling my brother my last words to him because he mean a lot to me. He changes my personality and affects me on how I treat people. I would say he is the closest kin after my mother I ever have, and sure I would regret his death forever in my life.

Correspondent: Which part of your life do you want to change?

Liesel: If I really had a choice to change an event in my life, I would like to change my brother’s death. Even though his death is my motivation to live on further on in the future, I think if he is alive, both of us would create a more interesting life to live. We may support each other at hard times, cheer each other up, and even help others who are much more in danger than us.

Correspondent: What do you think about wars?

Liesel: I think war is very very cruel. I don’t like the part of war which affects civilians. From my own perspective, I think that during a war, civilians shouldn’t be the one that is affected. Many innocent and honest people die from war even if they do not want to fight the opponent. If there would be a change in war, I wish that governments wouldn’t sacrifice the civilians’ right to live. Let’s take the Nazi as an example. A decision I don’t like they made was the Holocaust, that is why I accepted and befriended Max to hide and live with us. War should be just between two countries and its own military, if civilians are affected innocently than war has lost its own humanity.

Correspondent: What kind of things do you want people to learn from you?

Liesel: I would like people who has read my stories to learn about my perspective upon life. The most important of all, I would like them to overcome with their own fear in anyway they can. Over coming fear is like beating and defeating a monster who is trying to conquer your brain. A new world would be opened to you after conquering your own fears. The second thing I would like my readers to know is to be yourself even thought you have to defy a society’s values. Doing this action may be unsuitable for some people, but the action is what makes our society stronger. Let us take the politics in some countries as an example. Before World War two, many countries are colonized by western strong powers. People locally defy the values of not attacking the colonization and liberated their own country. I think that defying a value should be in a certain range of acceptability, if going too over, then there may be a problem too. The last thing I would like people to learn about my perspective is adapt. As our society changes as technology innovates, it is crucial to adapt and learn more or we will be eliminated from the society. Even though it is hard to adapt to an environment that you have no knowledge of, but by observing and interacting with other people would help a lot to adapt.

Ending

Correspondent: WOW Liesel, you have so many good perspectives and stories for our readers to learn.

Liesel: You are right, sharing my stories feels very exciting, thank you for having me here today again.

Correspondent: Thank you Liesel for being our newspaper’s headline, Bye!

Liesel: Its a pleasure, thank you.