While browsing through the mayors library, Sake wows Lisle’s love of books by saying, “[t]here were all different styles and sizes of lettering on the spines of the black, the red, the gray, the every- colored books. It was one of the most beautiful things Lies Engineer had ever seen.
” The books, and the words in them, bring Lies happiness. Sake also shows how words can make a person happy through Lisle’s weather reports. Every so often she would give Max a weather report in her own creative way.
For example, bringing a snowman down to Max, making him shiver, laugh, and ask, “Is this today’s weather report?Lisle’s quirky weather reports make Max feel happy, because they’re something he gets to look forward to. During an air raid, Lies read The Whistler to keep herself comfortable, and soon everyone was listening. “The youngest kids were soothed by her voice, and everyone else saw visions of the whistler running from the crime scene. ” The words offered a distraction from the scary reality, thus keeping people calm. These are just a few quotes from the novel that show how words can make a person feel happy. Sake also uses words to make the characters fearful.In order to make sure isle never tells anybody about Max, Hans results to some pretty extreme measures. He threatens, “I will take each and every one of your books -and will burn them I’ll throw them in the stove or the fireplace.
” In this case, the words making her afraid were about her books. The thought of losing what SE had grown to love so much brought her to tears. While reading The Whistler, Lies was “unsure whether it was the words or the open window that caused her to tremble. Every time she picked up or delivered from the mayors house she read three pages and shivered.Although she said she was unsure of what made her shiver, the fact that she was unsure meant she acknowledged the fact that the words made her afraid. While sneaking a peek at Man’s journal, Lies saw some things that startled her. She even silently admitted to herself, “[y]oh scared me, Max. ” The words in Man’s journal, with the help of the images that went along with them, had the power to truly frighten Lies.
Using quotes like these, Sake shows how words can make a person feel afraid. This novel shows you don’t need weapons or even a fake name to be evil.When words are used for evil, they can do even more damage to a person. When the mayors wife fired Rosa, Lies expressed her anger using some carefully chosen words. Weasel even noticed the damage she had done, seeing that “[s]he was battered and beaten up, and not from smiling this time. Lies could see it in her face. Blood leaked from her nose and licked at her lips. Her eyes had blackened.
Cuts had opened up and a series of wounds were rising to the surface of her skin. All from words. From Lisle’s words. ” The wordsLies used were so powerful, she could mentally see the damage she had done. She could tell that the words she had said made alls feel awful. In Man’s book, The Word Shaker, he talks about how Hitler decided he would use words to rule the world, and how “[h]e invited people toward his own glorious heart, beckoning them with his finest, ugliest words, handpicked from his forests. ” This is when Lies starts understanding how Hitler used words for evil and it made her very angry.
Because of all this bottled up anger, during her next visit to the mayor’s library she tore a book.