Preview

Brief Summary Of Zlata's Diary '

Satisfactory Essays
Open Document
Open Document
657 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Brief Summary Of Zlata's Diary '
Advanced English Book Review –
Zlata’s Diary:

Imagine yourself as a child again, your living life in a tiny, freezing cold house with no gas, electricity or water and insufficient food. You can't go anywhere outside because it isn't safe. There is no school for you to attend because there are too many risks and no one is willing to teach. You don't ever see your friends, and the thought of them in danger is always on your mind. You have played with all your toys and read all your books. You don’t make any loud noises because your house faces the snipers. You're growing out of all your clothes and your shoes no longer fit. Your always scared, and frightened to death because people around keep getting killed. And you don't know how long this
…show more content…
The Diary begins in September of 1991 as a typical fifth-grader excited and enthusiastic about starting school, she records the beginning of starting school in Sarajevo. Within six weeks of the diary, her hometown was involved in terrible war, and she was soon facing deprivation and the death of close friends and classmates.
Zlata and her father were forced to haul buckets of water to their apartment building. Bombs were falling continuously around the house, and sometimes smashing through windows, sometimes forcing the family to move into their damp, dark cellar. Sometimes Zlata would be left by herself while both of her parents tried to work. Constantly worried about the safety of her relatives and her own well being, she feared that the war would never end and she poured her deepest feelings into her beloved childhood diary, which she named Mimmy.
During the war, Zlata and her family lose almost everything. Zlata's mother's place of work is soon totally destroyed. Zlata can't go to school with any regularity at all. She almost forgets what fruit and vegetables taste like! Some of Zlata's friends are murdered horribly, innocent children caught in the crossfire of someone else's
…show more content…
Zlata admits she is a child "without a childhood" who only wants peace for Christmas in 1993. This line in the book especially was upsetting, as no child should ever be stripped of their childhood and innocence.
Despite the horrible cycle of devastation and death, the neighborhood becomes a bit of a family, all sticking together. There are good people who look out for the children and make sure that Zlata and the other children around still gets an occasional chocolate bar, some clothes to fit their growing bodies and small birthday presents. The new "family" tries to still celebrate the holidays and birthdays and marriages that still occur.
Zlata’s diary is soon published, it’s published during the war itself, and it was the only thing to save Zlata and her family. It was their ticket out of Sarajevo. Luckily, Zlata has a happy ending, happier than some of her friends and relatives. And of course, Zlata has never forgotten the war. She still continues to speak about the

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Satisfactory Essays

    “Where there’s hope, there’s life.”(Part 8, 19:18) Anne Frank is a Jewish Dutch Girl who begins her puberty when the war breaks out. Throughout the autobiography, Frank tells her beloved diary, whom she calls kitty, her personal history in the secret annex where she absconds with seven other people. The plot follows the young teen through her romance, difficulties, and explorations. At the end of the war, her father’s mission was to immortalize both her and her story. Thanks to Otto Frank’s determination and effort her diary was translated and published in 67 languages and over 30 million copies were sold.…

    • 129 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    chapter 12, Malala agrees to write a secret diary for BBC about her life. She explains what it's…

    • 214 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Ishmael Beah Analysis

    • 265 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Ishmael Beah is an unsettled thirteen year old boy. With no family to comfort him during the war, he is apprehensive. Images of violence, as cold as ice, constantly run through his brain. While circulating through villages, Baeh and his friends find dead bodies, burnt houses, empty bullet shells, and a variety more. By this point, it barely phases him. An empty village that the rebels have already raided is where the boys reside, at this time. This has become normal, because one may never know what the next day is going to give you. As stated by Ishmael Beah, "One of the unsettling things about my journey, mentally, physically, and emotionally, was that I wasn't sure when or where it was going to end. I didn't know what I was going…

    • 265 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Story Of Blima Essay

    • 653 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Blima walked home from the bakery, as she did every other ordinary day, however, little did she know that her life was about to change right before her eyes as she was shoved into the back a car. The title of the book is The Story of Blima: A Holocaust Survivor. It is a true story covering the events of Blima’s life, written by her daughter, Shirley Russak Wachtel. This book tells the true story of Blima’s experiences when she was captured and sent to a concentration camp. The book includes Before the Storm, telling the life of Blima before she was captured; Darkness Falls, which tells her life as a prisoned Jew on the concentration camp; and Daylight, when her nightmare was finally over and she was liberated from the camp.…

    • 653 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The story takes place in Gorazde, a city in Bosnia and Herzegovina, where political tension is rising and a war is clearly escalating. Fearing the worst, Slovenia and Croatia declare independence from Yugoslavia, while Bosnian Serbs are quickly trying to organize their armed forces. All this turmoil at home causes Edin, the main character and a graduate student who was studying engineering in Sarajevo, to return to his homeland in order to protect his family. Days before the beginning of the war, the tension between Bosniaks and Serbs is clear as they segregate each other around several parts of the city. In 1992, the first attack is made on Gorazde, in which people are raped, cruelly massacred and left homeless. Despite this, residents of the area manage to take back Gorazde even though they are living without the basic…

    • 1011 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    It is 1918, Liesel Meminger, a nine-year-old girl living in Germany during World War II. Undergoing many troubles Liesel’s experiences are narrated by Death, who describes both the beauty and destruction of life in this era. Liesel avoids the mayor's house at all costs because she suspects that the mayor's wife saw her steal the book from the bonfire. However, Liesel’s mother is working under the mayor, she has to pick up and deliver laundry everyday. The mayor’s wife has invited her to her library every time Liesel comes to pick up laundry. One day the mayor fires Liesel’s mother and that began the mischief of Liesel and…

    • 109 Words
    • 1 Page
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Once the young men of a country get pushed off to war many hardships follow in the homeland. Everyone in this novel was affected by war in the same way. All of the young man that went to…

    • 813 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Blima was a nice, caring person. She was known as the best child; smart. She worked at her Aunt Rachel’s bakery. She is also very self-concious about her chest and also has a lot of guilt because at 6 years old Blima dropped her brother, Zalman, and he died at 2 months old. Her mother does not blame Blima for his death, she was very forgiving.…

    • 580 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Lives are taken and hope seemed to be lost in the unforgiving claws of war. Even if the thousands of children who were forced to witness and take part in the atrocities of the Sierra Leone civil war escaped with their lives, they weren’t able to escape with their innocence. Seeing bodies mutilated by gunshots and severed limbs on the street on a daily basis is enough to scar any child. Ishmael Beah was one of the many whose childhood was abruptly taken away from him during the war. Fear ruled over the children’s minds as the tragedies they saw each day consumed their lives.…

    • 232 Words
    • 1 Page
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    A Night Divided Analysis

    • 514 Words
    • 3 Pages

    The main characters are 12 year old Gerta, her brothers Dominic and Fritz, her mom, her dad, and her best friend Anna. Gerta and her family live in the east side, and didn’t have much money. The night before the wall went up, her dad and Dominic traveled to the west side to look…

    • 514 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Story of Blima

    • 1619 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Chapter 2- In this chapter Blima talks about her two month old baby brother Zalman. She says how her mother let her hold him and that she was uncomfortable holding him and he was squirming around and she dropped him. It didn't take long for Zalman to die once his head hit the concrete at the bottom of the stairs. Noone even blamed Blima for it cause she was only a child. Then, they go to see their brother Victor and their Sister-in-Law. They stayed long enough that they could tuck in the neices.…

    • 1619 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    Plot * Liesel, her mother and her brother Werner are all travelling on a train, to greet Werner’s and Liesels foster parents. * Liesel, illiterate has a dream o Adolf Hitler and speaks to him in broken German. * As she is half awake, Liesels brother dies, and there were two Nazi soldiers who argue on weather they leave the body there or take it with them. * Both Liesel and her mother are traumatized by his sudden death and 2 days later he is buried. * After the ceremony finishes Liesel digs at his grave but is dragged away by her mother, but before getting on another train Liesel steals a book she is unable to even read the title of. * She is taken to a place in Munich called Himmel -"Heaven" to meet Rosa and Hans Hubermann, her foster parents. * She refuses to meet or get out of the car with her suitcase that only contains her clothes and the book she stole from her brother’s gravesite. * The only person that manages to get her out of the care is her foster father. * Liesel feels abandoned by her mother, but understands that it’s better for her to live there and be protected from the poverty; she also learns that her father was a communist, but she doesn’t yet know the meaning of that word. * Liesels foster mother acts harshly upon her and calls her a "pig girl" when she refuses to bathe, but claims to loves her. * Her foster father, Hans develops a closer relationship with her and teaches her how to roll cigarettes. she starts calling them "mama" and "papa" * Liesel got terrible nightmares about her brother the first few months and was accompanied by Hans, who she kept the book hidden from. * She kept the book as a symbol reminding her the last time she saw her brother, and the last time she saw her mother. * Liesel is put in school but has to stay with a much younger grade, just learning the alphabet. When she turns ten she joins the Hitler Youth. * Liesel makes a friend names Rudy who…

    • 1453 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Diary Of Nancy Brooks

    • 971 Words
    • 4 Pages

    The times in which this diary takes place is from April 14, 1991 to April 12,1993.…

    • 971 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The story of blima

    • 490 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Blima is a young girl- 20 years old. Her highest education is 8th grade, which she has learned basic knowledge. She was currently working in a small bakery shop. It was the year 1936, where most girls are promised in marriage at a young age. Then there was Adele, she was like a twin sister and was stunning- piercing chestnut, brown eyes. Blima's brother Zalman died at age 2. Blima had dropped him as a child which at that time, she wasn't aware of what was going on.…

    • 490 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The end of the film shares wonderful details regarding those who survived the holocaust. Many of them moves to America. A couple form a family and has seven grandchildren. One young man becomes a doctor. Helena, the little sister, lives in Poland and is a doctor. Estefania and one of the Jews celebrates their fifty first wedding anniversary.…

    • 437 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays