Survival Again?

Author's Note: This is my theme essay on the theme survival.  Although I had a piece just like this all about Life of Pi, this one compares this to Milkweed.  Please comment on my theme analysis.

Are you capable of killing or stealing from another human being? Now think about this.  Would you be willing to kill or steal from another human being if your survival depended on it?  In the books Milkweed and Life of Pi, both of the main characters are forced to either to kill or steal in order to survive.  Survival is a major theme in books, and it brings out a very thought-provoking question.  What would you do in order to survive?

In the book Milkweed, Misha is a young boy who lives on the streets of Warsaw during the Holocaust.  His only memory is that of stealing food on the streets in order to survive.  When all of the Jews, along with Misha,  are sent to the Warsaw Ghetto, Misha still finds a way to steal food.  He has already lived the lifestyle the Warsaw Ghetto has forced upon its occupants.  Also, although he steals food to feed himself, he is also able to share his stolen food with the Milgroms and the orphans. 

Pi, the main character in Life of Pi, had a much different situation compared to Misha's.  In the story, Pi is trapped on a boat in the middle of the ocean for 227 days accompanied by an adult Bengal tiger.  Unfortunately for him, Pi is a strict vegetarian and simply refuses to touch meat.  This is where the Bengal tiger is very important.  The Bengal tiger symbolizes Pi's development of an alter-ego, which enables him to, when faced with starvation, put aside his vegetarian ways to be able to stay alive.

As you can see, Misha is a static character due to his lack of change over the course of the story, unlike Pi, who is a dynamic character because of his dramatic change from beginning to end. The character in Milkweed who would best compare to Pi would be Uri, because, like Pi, Uri is a dynamic character.  Uri completely changes from being a Jew living on the streets stealing food to becoming a Nazi officer.  Becoming a Nazi officer was Uri's solution to surviving.

Pi's situation, as you can see, is much different compared to Misha's.  Being a vegetarian forces him to adapt to the sudden change of events while Misha can simply continue living the life he is very familiar with.  Although they face different ordeals, both characters have the same common goal; survival.