Twigs of Hair

I thought that Death's analogies to Max's hair was extremely powerful. Death's relation of Max's hair to feathers invokes a feeling of sparseness and even delicateless. It can also relate to a bird that has been locked in a cage for much too long and has lost almost all of its feathers.

The other object that Max's hairs are compared to are twigs. What makes this metaphor more moving is the fact that Death uses twigs instead of branches or roots. Also, twigs were once branches until they died and fell off the tree, similarly to Max's formerly full head of hair that Liesel had cut so many months ago. Liesel also enjoyed cutting Max's hair because they could talk while she did so, while when the Nazi's shaved Max's head, he would have been filled with sorrow, shame and even fear.

When Death explains Max's eyes as swampy, I saw them as sunken and worn. Worn because of the horrors that he had seen and partially from malnourishment. His eyes would be worn because of the things he had seen such as the death and torture occurring around him and even to him.