The Book Thief, Color and Poetry Activity

In The Book Thief, our narrator, Death, sees the world, people, and events in colors. For example, the opening words of the novel are:

“First the colors.

Then the humans.

That’s how I usually see things.”

(Death, pg. 3)

“People observe the colors of a day only at its beginnings and ends, but to me it’s quite clear that a day merges through a multitude of shades and intonations, with each passing moment. A single hour can consist of thousands of different colors. Waxy yellows, cold-spat blues. Murky darkness.” (Death, pg. 5)

How do you see things in your life?

Task: Choose a significant or memorable day from your life and create a visual which focuses on colors to reflect the events, feelings, and emotions of that day. Your visual will also need to include a free verse poem which explains and describes your day.

Process:

  1. Choose a significant day from your life. It may be memorable because it was an awesome day, or because it was a truly terrible day, that is your choice.
  2. On a piece of paper, brainstorm about the day by writing down the chronology of the day, people that were present, your feelings and emotions. Remember that you may have felt a range of emotions on that day, so be sure to include them all.
  3. Think about the colors you would use to describe these emotions. Some colors are often associated with specific events or emotions (for example, black is often associated with death). As in the book thief, feel free to play with these traditional associations, and to make up your own colors.
  4. Now, using newspaper, magazines, pictures off the internet, and especially your own drawings, collect images that represent the events from your memorable day and create a collage or visual to represent the events, objects, feelings, and emotions involved. Be sure to choose images that reflect the colors you associate with that day. You can achieve this however you prefer; you can color particular images using colored pencil or chalk, you could do a watercolor painting, or even do a dye wash over the top of your collage. The choice is up to you, so be creative!
  5. After completing your collage, stop and think about how it visually represents your significant day. Then, using both your collage and your brainstorming sheet as inspiration, write a free verse poem which explains your day, the images, your feelings, emotions, and the colors of your day.
  6. Make sure you put the poem ON the collage, it should go together as one piece!
  7. Your poster should be no smaller than 11 x 17!

*A free verse poem does not have to rhyme, or follow any set pattern. There are no rules to it, so use your imagination!

*This assignment is worth 100 points and will be due______!! Good luck!!