Quote: “In the darkness of my dark-beating heart, i know he would had loved it, alright.”

“You see?”

“Even death has a heart.”

By showing death has a heart, Markus Zusak is personifying death (the narrator). The “dark-beating heart” of death is contradicting the sadness and darkness of death. This is because “dark” connotes the idea of something being evil or bad. A heart represents life which is positive and welcoming. By describing a heart as dark and beating it shows that death has more life than known. This is also an oxymoron as life (the heart) is used to describe death. By giving death life it undermines the impact that death has and instead gives the impression of death being friendly and inviting and has feelings for its victims as well as having a evil dark side with bad intents.

MISSING: Any indication of the purpose of this form of personification in the specific context of this text.

• To help the reader relate to death – to help us understand the reason that Death was interested in Liesel, thereby becoming interested in her ourselves. In doing this we are offered an insight into her unique means of managing the horrors of the holocaust. She has faced death so many times, in so many forms, and yet still manages to maintain hope.