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Pages 9–17
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Once, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Storytelling
Innocence and Ignorance
Antisemitism vs. Human Dignity
Family
Morality, Violence, and Complicity
Summary
Analysis
Felix, shocked, wonders why the visitors would burn books—punishing Mother Minka for being “bossy” isn’t a good enough reason. Then he recalls Mother Minka complaining that the orphanage library was too disorganized. He speculates that the visitors are workers she hired to clean the library; they’re probably burning the most beaten-up books without Mother Minka having told them to.
Because no adult has told him the truth, Felix tries to figure out what is happening based only on what he sees. He’s too good-hearted and innocent to guess that the visitors are burning books out of hatred; instead, he invents a story in which the visitors are trying to be helpful.
Themes
Instead of asking Mother Minka about his parents in front of the visitors, Felix goes to wait in her office. There, he hears a man yelling in a language he doesn’t recognize and then sees one of the visitors, whom he thinks are “librarians.” Felix tells the man that the notebook he's holding isn’t a library book and wonders why Mother Minka would get librarians who don’t speak Polish to tidy the library.
Felix still thinks of the visitors, who are likely Nazi soldiers, as “librarians.” Yet he avoids them in the courtyard and tries to protect his notebook—which represents his love of stories, given to him by his parents—from the soldier he meets. This and Felix’s curiosity about why the “librarians” don’t speak Polish suggest that Felix is too smart to be deluded by his own innocent assumptions for long.
Themes
Mother Minka rushes in and asks Felix why he’s in her office. Then, calling him “Felek,” she says she remembers: she asked him to collect his notebook. Then she orders him upstairs. Wondering why she called him the wrong name, Felix notices she looks worried. Suddenly, Mother Minka says she’ll take Felix upstairs herself, pulls him from the room, and shoves him into the kitchen.
Themes
Dodie once told Felix that eating mold could “affect your brain.” Felix wonders whether Mother Minka has eaten moldy bread, given her weird behavior. She confesses she thought “those brutes” wouldn’t visit the orphanage. When Felix asks if she’s talking about the “librarians,” she says she means “Nazis.” She doesn’t know how the Nazis discovered she had “Jewish books,” but at least they don’t know Felix is Jewish.
Themes
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Felix infers that the Nazis, whoever they are, are traveling around burning Jewish books. Worried, he asks whether his parents specified when they’d arrive at the orphanage when they delivered the carrot. Sadly, Mother Minka explains that Sister Elwira put the carrot in Felix’s soup because she pities him. When Felix vehemently insists that his parents sent the carrot, Mother Minka asks him to “be brave.”
Themes
Mother Minka says they must hope that God, Jesus, the Virgin Mary, and the Pope will protect them. Felix, shocked, asks whether Adolf Hitler will protect them too. Mother Minka just shuts her eyes. Felix resolves to save the books in his parents’ shop, go find his parents, and tell that that their books are in danger.
The next morning, in chapel, Dodie asks Felix whether he’s really Jewish. Felix confirms it. Dodie asks, “What’s Jewish?” Felix, worried that Father Ludwik might notice them whispering, just says that “Jewish is like Catholic only different.” When Dodie says he’ll miss Felix, Felix gives Dodie his carrot and promises he’ll bring more carrots and turnips when he visits.
Themes
While the other orphans eat breakfast, Felix sneaks into the dormitory. On Dodie’s bed he leaves the books he brought from home, “the William books by Richmal Crompton,” which his parents used to read to him, as a sign that he’ll come back. He removes a page from his notebook and writes a letter to Mother Minka, thanking her and asking her to give Dodie his share of the soup. He takes his notebook and letters from his parents delivered “before the postal service started to have problems” and prepares to leave.
Themes
Jankiel appears and tells Felix not to go. Felix imagines that Jankiel wants him to stay so that he can keep inventing stories to distract the bullies. Felix assures Jankiel that he can invent stories himself—the story Jankiel was telling the girl orphans earlier about the horse killing his parents made them cry. Felix tears a story from his notebook and tells Jankiel to study it as a model. Jankiel thanks him.
Themes
When Felix tries to leave, Jankiel tells him he shouldn’t go: there are Nazis everywhere. When Felix says that’s why he’s leaving, Jankiel says that Mother Minka made him promise not to spread news of Nazi actions in the orphanage since it would frighten the orphans. Felix says he already knows the Nazis are burning books. After some internal conflict, Jankiel just tells Felix that he’ll “really regret” leaving. Though uneasy, Felix praises Jankiel’s “vivid imagination,” and then he leaves.
