Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Tattooist of Auschwitz, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Survival and Morality
Faith, Love, and Optimism
Unity, Sacrifice, and Empathy
Knowledge, Uncertainty, and Power
Summary
Analysis
On an achingly cold Sunday morning, Lale waits outside for Gita, but she doesn’t appear. Right as Lale is about to go inside, he sees Dana, who tells him that Gita is ill. She says that their kapo wants to send Gita away, but Lale tells her not to let this happen, asking what she thinks Gita has contracted. In response, Dana says that Gita most likely has typhus, since several of the women in their block have died of the sickness within a single week. Realizing that Gita will need medicine to survive, Lale urges Dana to keep her alive at all costs, promising to obtain medicine as long as Dana makes sure the SS don’t take Gita away. To that end, he tells Dana to carry or drag Gita to work each day and to hide her in the discarded clothes, making sure nobody notices her illness.
Life in the concentration camps is never easy. Lale learns this yet again when he suddenly has to face the possibility of Gita dying. Although things have been going relatively well for Lale over the past few weeks, he can’t make up for the fact that Gita is surrounded by sick prisoners and she’s forced to live in untenable conditions. All the same, Lale’s new relationship with Victor and Yuri allows him to at least explore the possibility of obtaining medicine for Gita, proving once more how valuable this connection is. For that matter, it’s worth remembering that Lale would never have had the courage to approach Victor and Yuri in the first place if he didn’t have the protection of his job as the tattooist, meaning that this position has once again put him in an advantageous position, one he can possibly use to save Gita’s life.
Themes
The next day, Lale rushes to Victor and Yuri and he asks them to get him penicillin or a similar kind of medication. To make his case, he drops everything he has received from “Canada” into Victor’s bag. Victor, for his part, assures Lale that they’ll be able to obtain the medication and then he gives Lale several packages of food.
Again, Lale’s new relationship with Victor and Yuri proves deeply beneficial, as it enables him to at least try to help Gita stay alive. If he didn’t have the protection of his job and hadn’t found a way to convince Victor and Yuri to smuggle items into the camp for him, it’s obvious that helping Gita would be out of his control. And yet, he still doesn’t know whether or not his plan to save her will work, a fact that once more infuses his life with uncertainty.
Themes
After meeting Victor and Yuri, Lale goes with Baretski and Leon to work at Auschwitz, but his mind remains on Gita as he tattoos the incoming prisoners. Afterward, Lale visits Dana and he gives her all of his food from breakfast. She tells him that she and Ivana successfully helped Gita to work and hid her beneath coats, giving her handfuls of snow to keep her hydrated. Still, Gita is not doing well, but Lale promises that he’ll have medication the following day. That night, he considers the fact that he hardly even knows Gita. Nonetheless, he senses that he wouldn’t be able to survive if she died. The following morning, Victor gives Lale the medication, which Lale passes on to Dana.
Lale’s feelings about Gita are already quite intense. This is because he fiercely believes in love and its sustaining qualities. Consequently, he wonders how he could possibly continue to survive if he were suddenly deprived of his newfound love for Gita. This thought underscores the fact that Lale associates survival with love and emotional connection, turning to this kind of intimacy as a way of remaining hopeful and optimistic about the future. This is an incredibly important aspect of Lale’s life, considering that there’s almost nothing else in his situation that can lend him hope.
Themes
The next day, Lale watches from afar as Dana and Ivana take Gita to work, noticing that Gita tries to lift her own head—a sign that she’s already beginning to regain strength. Seeing this, Lale rushes off to find Baretski, whom he asks for a favor. Baretski is suspicious, but Lale says that he will, in turn, do a favor for Baretski whenever he’s able to. This makes Baretski laugh, since he doesn’t think Lale could ever possibly help him with anything. All the same, Lale convinces Baretski by saying that he’ll owe him. Moving on, he persuades Baretski to have Gita transferred to a job in the administration building, where there is plenty of heating.
Once Lale sees that the medication has started to work its magic on Gita, he scrambles to ensure that she will continue to improve. To that end, he hopes to get her transferred to a better environment in which to recover. To do this, Lale must call upon his developing relationship with Baretski, who—although he’s obviously quite cold-hearted—seems to have taken a liking to Lale. In this way, Lale once more uses his connections to benefit others, indicating that one of the most valuable resources in a place like Birkenau is the social capital that comes along with human connection—even when that connection is with somebody as problematic and intimidating as Baretski.
Themes
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By the next Sunday, Gita is able to walk on her own. On Monday, an SS officer takes her to the administration building, where she discovers she’ll now be working. When Lale comes in later that day to give a secretary the papers from his work, he looks up and he winks at Gita. Seeing this, the woman sitting next to her nudges her playfully. The woman later introduces herself as Cilka, and Gita takes an immediate liking to her. Cilka is undeniably pretty and she’s somehow managed to avoid having her head shaved. Gita introduces Cilka to Dana and Ivana, and though Gita would understand if her friends were jealous of her new job and beautiful new friend, the two women embrace Cilka and they accept her as one of their own.
In the aftermath of Gita’s recovery, she not only gets a new, more desirable job, but she also gains a friend. In the harsh world of Auschwitz-Birkenau, the importance of this kind of human connection cannot be understated. After all, the only reason Gita is alive is because Lale went out of his way to cultivate a number of personal relationships. In turn, it becomes clear that Gita’s new friendship with Cilka is a significant development, since interpersonal connections are one of the only things the Nazis can’t take away from her.
Themes
