Summer of My German Soldier
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Summer of My German Soldier is a work of juvenile fiction written by Bette Greene, first published in 1973, and adapted into a 1978 made-for-TV movie staring Kristy McNichol.
The story is told first person by a twelve-year-old Jewish girl named Patty Bergen living in Jenkinsville, Arkansas during World War II. The action focuses on the escaped German Prisoner of War she befriends and protects, as well as her relationship with her abusive father, uncaring mother, and their maid. The sequel, Morning is a Long Time Coming, was published in 1978. A new musical version of the novel with music and lyrics by David Brush and Jim Farley opened in Ohio in August of 2003 staged by Encore Theater Company.
Summer of My German Soldier is on the American Library Association list of the 100 Most Frequently Challenged Books of 1990-2000 at number 89. [1] Most frequent reasons for challenges to this novel include the use of racial slurs (especially toward Ruth Hughes, Patty's African-American housemaid), depictions of Patty's abuse, and the relative lack of "good versus bad" stereotyping of Jews and Germans.
A prisoner of war camp is constructed in Patty's hometown, and, when one of the prisoners, an intelligent, polite young man named Frederick Anton Reiker, who speaks flawless English and secretly believes that Adolf Hitler is stretching the truth to make the Nazis oppose the Jews, manages to escape, she shelters him in the attic over her garage. They grow to love each other, yet romance seems far from their minds. For Patty, a Jewish girl aiding a German POW, nothing is ever the same. She finds the love she had been denied by her parents in him. She finds someone who can help her understand the world and life. When Anton, as he prefers to be called, attempts to save her when her father beats her (she warns him away before her father sees him), Patty realizes how much he cares about her. He was willing to put himself at great risk to help her.
Anton realizes that he is causing a great deal of trouble for Patty, so he decides to leave. He does, much to Patty's dismay, but not before giving her a gold ring, his most treasured possession, as well as a brief, good-bye kiss. Things might have been all right after that, but Patty can't help but talk about Anton's ring, since the thought of him makes her feel loved and valued. Everything falls apart for Patty when FBI agents, learning of the story she tells about an "old tramp" who gave her the ring, suspect that she got the ring from their escaped prisoner. They reveal to her that Anton was shot while trying to avoid arrest and died. Patty is devastated.
She is taken to court and sentenced to between three and six months' time in a reform school. The book ends uncertainly, with Patty comparing her situation to being in a lifeboat, only in sight of land, having to swim the last mile to safety. She doesn't know whether she'll be able to make it. As she says, "It might take me my whole lifetime to find out."
