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Schindler’s birthday represents his personal transformation during and after World War II. The novel makes note of several of his birthdays over the years. His 34th birthday celebration in 1942, relatively early on in the war, is perhaps his most raucous—he’s even briefly jailed for kissing a Jewish woman at his party. This first birthday thus highlights Schindler’s carefree attitude and partial naivete to the horrors of the Holocaust that were already underway in Poland. His 36th birthday celebration in 1944, approaching the end of the war, is much more subdued, with Schindler looking in the mirror and seeing how much weight he’s put on. Having realized the full extent of the Nazis’ atrocities and risked his own safety to help the Jewish prisoners working at his factory, this birthday represents Schindler’s shift from an ordinary, self-interested businessman to a more selfless version of himself.
For his 37th birthday in 1945, Schindler makes perhaps his most famous speech, boldly promising the prisoners in his camp that they will get to live out full lives. Years later, on his 53rd birthday in 1961, the first plaque to commemorate Schindler’s good deeds is unveiled. Finally, Schindler testifies confidential information about the personnel in Płaszów near 59th his birthday in 1967. Altogether, then, his birthdays provide a benchmark as to how he changes over a 25-year period: in 1942, he is young and boisterous, but the stress of the war seems make him more sedate and mature. Eventually, though, he regains that spirit from his younger days, becoming less a man, more a legend. Birthdays are also a celebration of life—perhaps Schindler’s greatest achievement is that he helped over a thousand Jewish people celebrate many more birthdays, which makes the emphasis on his own birthday fitting.
Schindler’s Birthday Quotes in Schindler’s List
The Schindler’s List quotes below all refer to the symbol of Schindler’s Birthday. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Chapter 27
Quotes
On April 28, 1944, Oskar—by looking sideways at himself in a mirror—was able to tell that his waist had thickened for his thirty-sixth birthday. But at least today, when he embraced the girls, no one bothered to denounce him. Any informer among the German technicians must have been demoralized, since the SS had let Oskar out of Pomorska and Montelupich, both of them centers supposed impregnable to influence.
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Chapter 37
Quotes
To call either of them a speech, however, is to demean their effect. what Oskar was instinctively attempting was to adjust reality, to alter the self-image of both the prisoners and the SS. Long before, with pertinacious certainty, he’d told a group of shift workers, Edith Liebgold among them, that they would last the war. He’d flourished the same gift for prophecy when he faced the women from Auschwitz, on their morning of arrival the previous November, and told them, “you’re safe now; you’re with me.” It can’t be ignored that in another age and condition, the Herr Direktor could have become a demagogue of the style of Huey Long of Louisiana or John Lang of Australia, whose gift was to convince the listeners that they and he were bonded together to avert by a whisker all the evil devised by other men.
Oskar’s birthday speech was delivered in German at night on the workshop floor to the assembled prisoners. An SS detachment had to be brought in to guard a gathering of that size, and the German civilian personnel were present as well. As Oskar began to speak, Poldek Pfefferberg felt the hairs on his lice stand to attention. He looked around at the mute faces of Schoenbrun and Fuchs, and of the SS men with their automatics. They will kill this man, he thought. And then everything will fall apart.
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Get the entire Schindler’s List LitChart as a printable PDF.
Schindler’s Birthday Symbol Timeline in Schindler’s List
The timeline below shows where the symbol Schindler’s Birthday appears in Schindler’s List. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Chapter 12
On April 28, 1942, Schindler’s 34th birthday, he has a boisterous celebration, which starts at Emalia. He brings cakes and cigarettes into...
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...to Czurda that he only kissed a Jewish girl because he was drunk on his birthday. Czurda says he has gotten some calls from big-timers about Schindler; Schindler is too essential...
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Chapter 27
On April 28, 1944, Schindler notices on his birthday that he’s putting on weight. His celebration is more subdued than in previous years, and...
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Chapter 35
One such complaint letter arrives on April 28, 1945, Schindler’s 37th birthday. He is overjoyed to find that his antitank shells fail all quality-control tests (because that...
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The birthday telegram raises the question of how Schindler’s Brinnlitz factory managed to survive the seven months...
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Chapter 37
Schindler celebrates his 37th birthday on a Shabbat with all the prisoners. The day is festive, despite the fact that...
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In the days before his birthday, Schindler secretly lodges complaints to Hassebroeck about Liepold. He makes similar charges about Liepold to...
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On his birthday, Schindler makes a speech promising the prisoners continued life. SS officers and German civilian personnel...
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Within two days of Schindler’s birthday, Liepold gets orders transferring him to an SS infantry battalion near Prague. He goes without...
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...factory floor. The Germans haven’t left yet, though they are making escape plans. Unlike Schindler’s birthday speech, this one is recorded in shorthand by two prisoners (though those present will say...
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Epilogue
...Tel Aviv becomes the first place to honor Schindler, unveiling a plaque for his 53rd birthday. Madritsch and Titsch are among the others with memorial trees in the park.
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...Schindler continues to testify against war criminals, giving confidential information about Płaszów personnel on his birthday in 1967. He is a willing witness but also a careful and meticulous one. In...
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