Week 6: Discussion of All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr

Serena and I would like to welcome you to the sixth and final discussion of All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr. Feel free to join the conversation in the comments.

Were you surprised that Volkheimer encouraged Werner to save Marie-Laure? What did you think about Werner’s actions in the Le Blanc house and the time he spent with Marie-Laure?

SERENA: I wasn’t surprised by Volkheimer’s encouragement. It seems that he always looked out for Werner and wanted the best for him. He seemed to know that saving Marie-Laure was important to Werner.

I didn’t actually think too much about Werner’s actions in the house other than hurry up and save Marie! I was glad that he made it in time, even though there was some big tension there with von Rumpel. I also think that in times of war, emotions are heightened, and his connection with Marie-Laure is something that can’t be explained too rationally.

ANNA: I agree. I’m glad that Werner was able to do the right thing when it counted. Overall, I think he was just a kid who grew up in the wrong place at the wrong time. He really wanted to become something, and his intelligence was twisted by the Nazis and used in deplorable ways.

In addition to the heightened emotions that accompany war, Werner was really just a child, and Marie-Laure’s connection to his childhood and a less complicated time played into his feelings as well. He wanted to be done with the war, and he wanted something good to come out of it, and a love story would be one way that could happen.

I was torn about Marie-Laure’s reaction to finding out about Werner years after the war. It seems that she meant so much more to him than he meant to her. That broke me up, but of course, we saw both sides to the story. Marie-Laure was grateful for Werner saving her, but when it boils down, he was a German and she’d lost her father, so it was so much more complicated than that. Also, Marie-Laure has decades of hindsight and life that Werner was never able to have.

SERENA: I think because he heard her great-uncle on the radio, Werner’s connection to her is stronger. Really she doesn’t meet him until he saves her and he only tells her of what he has done to protect her afterward, so it’s hard for her to feel the same connection. I wasn’t surprised by her reaction because she’s so removed from it now and the loss of so many has left her with little connection to the past. Her only connections now are her work, her lovers, and her daughter, so much more of her life is grounded in the present than in the past.

It’s sad we don’t get to see what would have happened had Werner lived. I wonder if the war would have broken him so much that he had given up his dreams, but he was so creative, maybe not.

ANNA: I wasn’t surprised by her reaction, really. Just knowing how much she meant to Werner from following his thoughts and being sad about his death made me wish it could be that way.

Unfortunately, I think he was already broken by the war. Frederick and the little girl affected him so deeply that he was haunted by them. Maybe that would have lessened over time, and his saving Marie-Laure seemed to redeem himself in his eyes a little bit. His death shows just how sick and beaten down he was, the visions he was having, and his longing for home, the light, etc.

What did you think of Jutta’s meeting with Volheimer and with Marie-Laure?

ANNA: I think Jutta needed Volkheimer’s visit and her subsequent visits to Saint-Malo and to Paris to see Marie-Laure for closure. Werner’s notebook brought her back to the happier, simpler times when they were children, and her visit to Saint-Malo helped her try to understand Werner’s last letter to her about the sea. And I think knowing that he had fallen in love, whether it was real or not, whether it was just for a moment, made her feel as though Werner had lived and done something good despite having gone to the Hitler Youth school and fought for the Nazis, which were things she couldn’t talk about after the war.

SERENA: I think the meeting with Volkheimer was so odd, but he never really talked much. He sort of just drops the duffle off, eats food, and then spends some time with Max before leaving. It’s funny that the husband doesn’t really interact or think much of the meeting…like its normal. But we also get a much more internal story here from Jutta, who has been so much out of the story. It’s good to see her reflect on her brother.

I love that the meeting between Jutta and Marie-Laure is not overly emotional; it seems that they both have moved beyond the past and have their own lives. They have moved on but this gives them the closure they need.

ANNA: It seems like Jutta and her husband had the kind of relationship where they respect their wartime experiences and whatever ways they’ve used to move past them. He seemed to know about Werner but also that Volkheimer’s presence upset or at least jarred Jutta. A lot of the WWII novels I’ve read that focus on Germans in the aftermath seem to portray them as stoic and not overly emotional. Not sure how accurate that is or whether it plays into Jutta’s reaction here.

What do you think about what happened to the diamond, in terms of its overall importance to the story?

SERENA: That diamond…I want to believe that Werner released it into the sea and that he saved the house model to remember Marie-Laure. I want to believe that he let that go for something much more precious — a symbol of the boy with the hopes and dreams he once had before the war tore it up.

ANNA: I wish we’d been given a glimpse of Werner fishing the house out of the ocean and what his thought process was there. Von Rumpel seemed to think Werner was at the house for the same reason he was, but Werner didn’t know anything about the diamond. So it’s likely that he didn’t grasp it’s value, especially not in the midst of the chaos of the cease fire, and that he would believe the house that Marie-Laure set free and the key she gave him to be more precious.

SERENA: Von Rumpel had a one track mind where that diamond was concerned. I’m glad he was dispatched and not by his disease.

ANNA: I agree. He exemplified the Nazi greed and superstition.

What did you think about the scene with Frederick, three decades after the war?

SERENA: As for Frederick, I love that his mother — even though she seemed like she was a social butterfly and not really connected to her son before — continued to care for him after the war. I wonder what happened to his over-bearing father. I love the symbols of birds and how that seems to bring Frederick back to life even if for an instant. His love of birds seemed to be something that was really ingrained in him. It makes sense that a bird would awaken him, even if it wasn’t the picture Werner kept for him.

ANNA: I didn’t know what to think of his mother at first, but she turned out not to be so bad. She truly seemed to care about him, especially when she gets the picture of the birds Werner had meant to send him all those years ago. I thought it was telling that in the midst of getting Marie-Laure out of the house, amid his hunger and thirst, he saw the book of birds and pulled out a specific picture for Frederick. I know Werner felt guilty about what happened with Frederick, but he also was his friend first.

SERENA: I loved that he still thought of Frederick as a friend even though he was guilt-ridden about what happened. I was glad to see that the mother was not that high-society, stuck on connections, and not-caring mother that I thought she was.

I wonder if I would have just been satisfied with the scene where you see Marie-Laure and Etienne reunite and not all this decades later stuff.

ANNA: I don’t think the very last scene in 2014 was necessary, but I’m glad for the ones in 1974. I myself found some closure in learning what happened to Marie-Laure, Jutta, Volkheimer, and Frederick in the years after the war, what they had accomplished and learned. I think for some it is important to how those who survived moved on, whether they made something of themselves, etc.

Do you think the book was deserving of the Pulitzer Prize?

SERENA: As I didn’t read any of the other finalists, I can’t really say. I do think this is a good read and very well done. Is it my favorite in WWII historical fiction, probably not. Not to say that I didn’t find it engaging from start to finish.

ANNA: I agree. Without having read the other contenders, I do believe it is worthy. It is well written, complex, and seems well researched. I really liked it — I think it’s worthy of a 5-star rating — but it isn’t my most favorite novel set during that time.

We hope you enjoyed the book and our discussions as much as we did. Please feel free to answer the questions in the comments and continue the discussion by asking questions of your own. We’d love to hear your thoughts.

We’ve made a slight change in our readalong schedule for the rest of the year. We will announce the next readalong soon. Stay tuned!

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