The Zoo Keeper's Wife

In the section that I read this week of The Zoo Keeper's Wife the Polish people start to worry about German forces lead by Hitler invading. The Zabinskis try to avoid reality of the thought of bombing Poland. One morning Antonina wakes to the sound of hundreds of bomber planes. Antonina is on her way to Rejentowka to retrieve her son and on her way is amazed by what she saw. "German aircraft looming near in seconds, chewing up the skies, flying low overhead, panicking people and horses alike. Pelted by bullets, everyone hurried through clouds of flying dirt, the unlucky fell, and the relatively lucky fled beneath splattering machine-gun fire. Catching a bullet was sheer chance and for seven hours Antonina beat the odds, but not without scenes of the dead and dying etched into memory." This is a very powerful quote, it shows that the bombing and death affected Antonina and that war never leaves ones memory. It also shows how violent this war is. Although it's only the beginning it is already killing many people. Antonina is also worried about her son, she thinks that if he grows up watching the war he will grow to think that that is what life will always be like. "At least her son, in Rejentowka, was spared these images, so hard to erase, especially for a small child whose brain, busily sampling the world, was learning what to expect and stitching those truths in place at a trillion connections. stay prepared for this world the rest of your life, a child's brain tells itself, a world of mayhem and uncertainty." If Rys, Antonina's son grows up seeing all of the killing of the war, Antonina thinks that his brain will be messed up forever. That he will expect the rest of his life to be like this.

The war gets worse so Jan and Antonina start to worry about the zoo and the animals. With the bombs, and animals went crazy. "The elephants trumpeted wildly, they hyenas sobbed in a frightened sort of giggle interrupted by hiccups, the African hunting dogs howled, and the rhesus monkeys, agitated beyond sanity, battled one another, their hysterical shrieks clawing the air." The animals start to go insane, this is foreshadowing for what might come. The animals are in a worse situation than the humans because humans can adapt to new situations, animals in the zoo are dependent on people. Jan and Antonina are very worried about how to keep the zoo running and how to save the animals. They are very attached to the zoo and the animals within. "In this Luftwaffe attack, a half-ton bomb destroyed the polar bears' mountain smashing the walls, moats, and barriers and freeing the terrified animals. When a platoon of Polish soldiers found the panicky bears, ribboned with blood and circling round their old haunt, they quickly shot them." This shows that the animals in the zoo are actually in danger because of this war. Something has to be done to save them. If the Germans aren't afraid to kill humans they won't be afraid to kill animals in the zoo.

The Zoo Keeper's Wife

The book The Zoo Keepers Wife starts out talking about a zoo in Poland. Jan and Antonina are the owners of the zoo. The first chapter shows that Antonina is really close with the animals. I think this is very interesting. Anatonina shows such a close relationship with the animals it almost seems as though she is a part of them. Her husband describes her by saying, "She's so sensitive, she's almost able to read their minds. . . . She becomes them. . . . She has a precise and very special gift, a way of observing and understanding animals that's rare, a sixth sense. . . It's been this way since she was little"(26). The fact that Antonina in a sense becomes the animals makes me think that there are probably people in the world today that have this rare gift. I also have a feeling that this special gift will come in handy later in the book. She uses her skills when they open the box of kittens and they start hissing she says, "Human hands with so many moving fingers scare them, and our loud voices and the sharp light from the lamp"(27). Right away when they start hissing Antonina explains to Jan, her husband, what is wrong and exactly how the kittens are feeling. Anatonina can use her gift to interpret exactly how the animals feel, and by changing it, she helps the animals.

Jan and Antonina seem like really good zookeepers. They are definatly fit for the job. "Antonina and Jan had learned to live on seasonal time, not mere chronicity. Like most humas, they did abide by clocks, but their routine was never quite routine, made up as it was of compatible realities, one attuned to animals, the other to humans"(20). This shows that Antonina and Jan change their schedules to help the animals. Antonina and Jan basically devote their lives to these animals living in the zoo. "The Zabinskis shared their home with orphaned newborn or sick animals, as well as pets, and the feeding adn schooling of lodgers fell to Antonina, whose animal wards clamored to be fed"(23). The Zabinskis so as far as keeping animals in their house, this demonstrates their love and care for animals. Not many people would be willing to keep part of a zoo within their own house and have the animals walk freely. The Zabinskis treat the animals at their zoo like children. The Zabinskis are very good zookeepers and I am excited to see what happens in the rest of the book.



Ackerman, Diane. The Zookeeper's Wife. New York, NY: Norton paperback, 2008.