"Perhaps it was a mistake not to have told her the truth. Perhaps her tears might help to wash away some of the misery in the world (94)". If you were in Simon's position when he went to see Karl's mother, would you have done the same thing (kept silent)?
If the SS man had not been dying would he have been so truly repentant? Would he have felt the same way if he had survived the war and was reflecting on his acts?
Some of the commentators in The Sunflower believe that those who were following orders were just as guilty as those who gave them; others, like Dith Pran, draw a moral line between followers and leaders. Would you hold them equally responsible?
What do you *give* when you grant forgiveness? What does forgiveness look like? Is there a connection to justice?
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3 comments:
Well, I'm not very good at all at in-class discussion... So I guess I'd better post here.
First question: If I had been in Simon's place, I would have told Karl's mother the truth. Even though lying to her made her happy, I'm sure that if she knew that it was a lie, she would have wanted the truth. I don't think that she would have thought any differently of Karl if she had known how he died, even though she might not have been proud of him. She would have still loved her momories of him just as she always had, so what's wrong with knowing the truth?
Question two: I think that the SS man wouldn't have been /as repantant/, but he would have felt just the same if he had survived. Even though he joined the Hitler Youth, he hadn't done that with the intention to kill anyone, I don't think.. He was forced into it by peer pressure, and if what he said was true, he felt sick when he was forced to kill people. His dying in the hospital only forced him to act on what he felt sooner and with more determination, because he hadn't had any time after the war to get used to those memories.
~Atsuko
If I was in Simons place I would not have said anything to Karl's mother. I think I would not have because she was an old lady with no husband, no son, no house nowhere to go or nobody to take care of her so she was suffering enough and I would not want to make her suffering increase. Also I think that deep down she had seen the atrocities the Nazi's had commited but I am not sure. It would be awful to break the old lady heart, if not already broken.
For the next question I do not think that he would repent as much as he did in his death but I think he wanted to go off dying on an
'empty' brain. I think that without the feeling that he was dying he would never had done that. He did not join the army so he could prance around in fields, he joined the army with intentions of keeping his nation safe but in the job descrition killing is a bolded requirment.
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