Quotes & Sayings About Max Vandenburg

Where Hans Hubermann and Erik Vandenburg were ultimately united by music, Max and Liesel were held together by the quiet gathering of words. — Markus Zusak

Thank you.
For Max Vandenburg, those were the two most pitiful words he could possibly say, rivaled only by I'm sorry. There was a constant urge to speak both expressions, spurred on by the affliction of guilt. — Markus Zusak

For Liesel Meminger, the early stages of 1942 could be summed up like this:
She became thirteen years of age. Her chest was still flat. She had not yet bled. The young man from her basement was now in her bed.
***Q&A***
How did Max Vandenburg end up in liesel's bed? He fell. — Markus Zusak

She walked down the basement steps. She saw an imaginary framed photo seep into the wall - a quiet-smiled secret. No more than a few meters, it was a long walk to the drop sheets and the assortment of paint cans that shielded Max Vandenburg. She removed the sheets closest to the wall until there was a small corridor to look through. The first part of him she saw was his shoulder, and through the slender gap, she slowly, painfully, inched her hand in until it rested there. His clothing was cool. He did not wake.
She could feel his breathing and his shoulder moving up and down ever so slightly. For a while, she watched him. Then she sat and leaned back.
Sleepy air seemed to have followed her.
The scrawled words of practice stood magnificently on the wall by the stairs, jagged and childlike and sweet. They looked on as both the hidden Jew and the girl slept, hand to shoulder.
They breathed.
German and Jewish lungs. — Markus Zusak

THE LAST WORDS OF MAX VANDENBURG: You've done enough. — Markus Zusak

They sat a few meters apart, speaking very rarely, and there was really only the noise of turning pages ( ... ) Where Hans Hubermann and Erik Vandenburg were ultimately united by music, Max and Liesel were held together by the quiet gathering of words.
"Hi, Max."
"Hi, Liesel."
They would sit and read. — Markus Zusak

He had what he called just a small ration of tools:
A painted book.
A handful of pencils.
A mindful of thoughts.
Like a simple puzzle, he put them together. — Markus Zusak

The juggling comes to an end now, but the struggling does not. I have Liesel Meminger in one hand, Max Vandenburg in the other. Soon I will clap them together. Just give me a few pages. — Markus Zusak

In the basement of 33 Himmel Street, Max Vandenburg could feel the fists of an entire nation. One by one they climbed into the ring to beat him down. They made him bleed. They let him suffer. Millions of them
until one last time, when he gathered himself to his feet ... — Markus Zusak

You hide a Jew. You pay. Somehow or other, you must. — Markus Zusak

A fact regarding Max Vandenburg
He would search the faces on Munich street for a book-thieving girl. — Markus Zusak

Come on, Max,' she whispered, and even the sound of Mama's arrival at her back did not stop her from silently crying. It didn't stop her from pulling a lump of salt water from her eye and feeding it onto Max Vandenburg's face.
Mama took her.
Her arms swallowed her.
'I know',she said.
She knew. — Markus Zusak