84 pages • 2 hours read
The Boy On The Wooden Box
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Themes
Passive Resistance in the Face of Oppression
Faced with a level of prejudice and hostility that dehumanizes them, Leon and his family were forced to endure the increasing violence of their world after the Germans invaded and occupied Poland. However, although they recognized the relative helplessness of their situation, they nonetheless found small ways to resist the Nazis’ oppression. In Leyson’s words, “We fought the depravity of the Nazis with subtle forms of resistance” (83).
This dynamic is clear even in the earlier moments of the war, when Leon and his siblings were forced to gain a great deal of maturity and make decisions that even adults would be hard-pressed to face. They banded together to locate their imprisoned father and bring him food, and later, when they were trapped within the harsh world of the ghetto, they risked their own lives and safety to carry a sick woman to the clinic in defiance of the curfew. While being forced out of the ghetto, Leon’s mother deliberately broke their furniture, and Leyson comments, “It felt so good to do something against the Germans, even if the only thing we could do was destroy our own possessions” (107). These and other actions indicate that despite the injustice that he and his family had to survive, they found ways to assert their autonomy, even if only to themselves.
This dynamic is also apparent at a community-wide level. During the period in the ghetto, musicians and actors put on impromptu shows to raise the morale of those around them and found creative ways to inject a little joy into the otherwise dismal atmosphere. As Leyson states, “Even when I didn’t quite get the jokes, I laughed anyway because it was a way to show the Nazis they didn’t control me” (83). In this context, laughter itself became a weapon against oppression, demonstrating the fact that while external injustices could be imposed, the Nazis could not break the Jewish people’s spirit as long as those imprisoned found subtle but distinct ways to resist.
European Jews also resisted “the bleak surroundings” through the act of “sharing their hopes and dreams and stories with one another” (83), and this trend becomes most noticeable in Mr. Luftig’s kind rapport with Leon. The practice of religion in defiance of Nazi hatred—holding services, observing the sabbath ritual, and giving religious instruction to community members—served a similar function, preserving the Jewish way of life in some form despite the oppressive circumstances.
Drawing Strength from Family Loyalty
From the very beginning of the narrative, it is clear that the young Leon loved his family deeply, and as the war progressed, he took considerable risks to aid the family and sought to stay with his parents at any cost. Most notably, he preferred to follow his mother into Płaszów, a deadly concentration camp, even when he had the option of hiding with some other boys his age. As Leyson reflects, “I’m not sure why I felt the pull so strongly, but I knew I had to be with my mother. She and I had been through so much together. She was my strength and I was hers” (110). By openly risking his own life to remain with his family, Leon demonstrated the depths of his loyalty, and as chance would have it, this decision also saved his life, for staying with his family ultimately allowed him to become one of the fortunate people on “Schindler’s list.” The Boy on the Wooden Box thus frames loyalty as integral to survival, even in circumstances where self-preservation might seem the rational choice.
Leon demonstrated his dedication to his family in a variety of ways as the war progressed. While in Płaszów, Leon snuck away to find his parents, at great risk to his own safety. As he declares, “All I wanted was to see my family again, no matter what the situation” (111). Because Leon remained with his family members throughout most of the war, this vital connection helped him to maintain his inner strength and persevere.
It is also important to note that Leon was not the only member of his family to show such loyalty. For example, when Tsalig and his fiancée, Miriam, were being transported in a cattle car to the Belzec concentration camp, Schindler caught up to the car and offered Tsalig the chance to escape. However, he chose to remain with Miriam, his own chosen family, thereby sealing his own fate. However, far from disproving the relationship between loyalty and survival, such anecdotes underscore it, as the work implies that betraying one’s loved ones would entail such a fundamental distortion of one’s humanity that it would represent no real survival at all.
The Importance of Kindness in Dark Times
Throughout the narrative, Leyson presents multiple scenes in which the prevailing cruelty is tempered by acts of kindness and generosity. Many of these examples manifest among those who sought to improve the Jewish people’s plight however they could, even if their efforts remained limited by circumstances.
This dynamic appears early in the book in an anecdote about Wojek, a gentile friend of Moshe’s, helping him to sell his suits on the black market while the family was living in the ghetto. Although Wojek lacked the power to change the family’s situation, he nonetheless provided them with a way to improve their lives and survive. Leon’s connection with Mr. Luftig provides another example, for the man made it a point to spend time with the boy and emphasized the importance of simple pleasures amid greater uncertainty. This theme persists to the very end of the narrative, as can be seen in the random kindness of the woman on the train to Los Angeles, who helped Leon to decipher American money. From her perspective, this incident may have been a forgettable moment, but the greater implications of her gesture are apparent in Leyson’s assertion that he never forgot her act of kindness, which helped an overwhelmed young boy to acclimate to his new circumstances.
However, the most prominent acts of kindness in the narrative are those shown by Oskar Schindler, who ran great risks on behalf of his Jewish workers during the war years, engaging in calculated acts of diplomacy and bribery of Nazi officials in order to engineer ways to keep employing Jews in his factory, thereby saving them from extermination. Both Emalia and his subsequent factory in Brünnlitz—although harsh and demanding in their own ways—nonetheless became vital sanctuaries for Schindler’s Jewish workers. Notably, even Emalia’s grim exterior was a façade that was meant to conceal the atmosphere of dignity and kindness that prevailed inside, where the workers were cared for and treated as employees rather than as prisoners.
In addition to these large-scale kindnesses, many of which put Schindler himself at risk from the Nazi Party, he also engaged in an array of smaller yet no less important gestures, such as making pleasant conversation with his workers and sharing gifts with them. He also refrained from reprimanding Leon when the boy momentarily fell idle at his job, and he went out of his way to establish a rapport with the wary young Leon by calling him to his office for kind words and additional food. Through these vignettes, Leyson relates the complex line that Schindler had to walk, and his account leavens the darker aspects of human nature with strong elements of hope and optimism.
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