The Book Thief
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50 free The Book Thief trivia questions with answers — literature quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
The Book Thief follows Liesel Meminger, a foster child in Nazi Germany who cannot read when she arrives on Himmel Street and ends up risking a great deal for stolen pages. The novel is told by one of the strangest narrators in modern fiction, and it has become a fixture of school reading lists and book clubs. This quiz runs from the prologue to the epilogue. It covers Liesel's thefts and reading lessons, Hans and Rosa Hubermann, Rudy Steiner and the neighbors, the fugitive hidden in the house, and well-known chapters such as The Aryan Shopkeeper, Tricksters and A Good Girl. There are also questions on the book's themes, its literary devices, its author and the 2013 film. It is written for students checking their reading, teachers who want a ready-made multiple-choice quiz, and readers who simply loved the story. Every answer comes with a short explanation, so a wrong guess still leaves you knowing the novel a little better.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01In The Book Thief, who narrates Liesel Meminger's story and says it saw her only three times?
Death
Death tells the story, a weary and wry guide who distracts himself from his work by studying the sky. He admits that the survivors left behind are what he finds hardest to look at.
Q 02In The Book Thief, which stolen book does Hans use for Liesel's first midnight reading lessons?
The Grave Digger's Handbook
The Grave Digger's Handbook was dropped by an apprentice at her brother's burial, and Liesel took it though she could not read. Hans, a poor reader himself, is puzzled by her choice.
Q 03In The Book Thief, which American athlete does Rudy imitate by rubbing charcoal over his body?
Jesse Owens
Jesse Owens had just won four gold medals at the 1936 Berlin Olympics. Rudy's father drags him home from the track and warns him never to pretend to be black again.
Q 04In The Book Thief, the Hubermanns live on poor Himmel Street; what does 'Himmel' mean in English?
Heaven
Heaven is the meaning, and the narrator makes bitter use of it, asking whether anyone would bomb a place with such a name.
Q 05In The Book Thief, the narrator's final line to an elderly Liesel is 'I am haunted by' what?
Humans
Humans are what haunt the narrator, who wants to ask Liesel how one species can be "so ugly and so glorious" but never does.
Q 06In The Book Thief, in which city far from Germany does Liesel die as an old woman?
Sydney
Sydney is where she dies, a grandmother with three children of her own. In her last vision she sees Hans, Rosa, her brother and a boy with lemon-colored hair.
Q 07In The Book Thief, where is Liesel writing when bombs fall on Himmel Street, sparing only her?
In the basement
In the basement, working late on her own life story, she is shielded from a raid that arrives before the sirens can wake her sleeping neighbors.
Q 08In The Book Thief, what does Hans hand a collapsing Jewish prisoner being marched through town?
A piece of bread
A piece of bread earns both men a whipping from the guards. Fear that the Gestapo will now search the house forces Max to leave it that same night.
Q 09In The Book Thief, what does Rudy keep asking Liesel for, even waist-deep in an icy river?
A kiss
A kiss is all he ever asks for, and Liesel refuses every time. She gives him one at last when she finds him lying lifeless on their bombed street.
Q 10In The Book Thief, which instrument does Hans play in bars, having learned it as a soldier?
Accordion
Accordion lessons came from Erik Vandenburg, a Jewish comrade in the First World War. Hans kept the instrument after Erik was killed and went looking for his family.
Q 11In The Book Thief's prologue, which color of sky does the narrator say it likes best?
Chocolate
Chocolate is the sky the narrator likes best, though it claims to enjoy every shade. Noticing colors is how it takes its mind off the grieving people left behind.
Q 12In The Book Thief, what does Rudy Steiner take from his toolbox and place on a dying enemy pilot?
A teddy bear
A teddy bear, packed to calm any child he met while burgling houses, goes onto the pilot's chest instead. The airman thanks him in English and dies.
Q 13In The Book Thief, where does Liesel's young brother Werner die on the way to their foster home?
On a train
Q 21In The Book Thief, which book does Liesel pull, still smoking, from the Führer's birthday bonfire?
The Shoulder Shrug
The Shoulder Shrug survives the flames, and Liesel hides it under her shirt until it scorches her. The Nazis banned it because its hero is Jewish.
Q 22In The Book Thief, who sees Liesel steal from the bonfire and later shows her a private library?
Ilsa Hermann
Ilsa Hermann, the mayor's wife, says nothing about the theft and instead lets Liesel loose among her shelves. She has grieved in silence since losing her son in 1918.
Q 23In The Book Thief, what does Hans Junior call his father in an argument over the Nazi Party?
A coward
On a train bound for Munich, Liesel watches him die while their mother sleeps. Two days later he is buried in a snowy cemetery near the line.
Q 14In The Book Thief, Rosa's favorite insult for Liesel, 'Saumensch', is built on which animal?
A pig
A pig is the animal behind it: 'Saumensch' is the form for girls and women, and Rosa keeps a matching 'Saukerl' for men and boys. Liesel and Rudy soon trade both like nicknames.
Q 15In The Book Thief, on the back of what does Hans write out Liesel's first alphabet lessons?
Sandpaper
Sandpaper from his painting work stands in for writing paper, its smooth side taking the letters and a sketch for each one. The lessons run long into the night.
Q 16In The Book Thief, why was Liesel's father taken away by the Nazis before the story begins?
He was a Communist
He was a Communist, a label Liesel hears long before she understands it. At the town bonfire she finally connects a speaker's rant to her vanished parents.
Q 17In The Book Thief, how does Rosa Hubermann earn extra money from the wealthier households in town?
Washing and ironing
Washing and ironing brings in the extra money, and Rosa sends Liesel out on the deliveries hoping customers will pity her. As the war bites, they cancel one by one.
Q 18In The Book Thief, what does neighbor Frau Holtzapfel keep doing to the Hubermanns' front door?
Spits on it
Spits on it, as part of a long feud with Rosa, and wiping the door clean becomes Liesel's chore. The truce comes years later, when Frau Holtzapfel wants a favor from Liesel.
Q 19In The Book Thief, what do Liesel and Rudy steal on their first raid with Arthur Berg's gang?
Apples
Apples are the haul, six each, and since they cannot take stolen fruit home they eat the lot in half an hour. Liesel spends the night being sick.
Q 20Which author wrote The Book Thief, the 2005 novel about a foster girl growing up in Nazi Germany?
Markus Zusak
Markus Zusak wrote it after four earlier novels, and it became an international bestseller that reached cinemas in 2013.
A coward is his verdict on a father who still has not joined the Nazi Party. The son stays away that Christmas too, and ends up fighting on the Russian front.
Q 24In The Book Thief, what does Hans Hubermann trade away to buy Liesel two books for Christmas?
His cigarettes
His cigarettes, hand-rolled and carefully hoarded, pay for Faust the Dog and The Lighthouse. Liesel had expected no present at all.
Q 25In The Book Thief, what act of Hans Hubermann's left his Nazi Party application stuck on hold?
Painting over a slur
Painting over a slur daubed on a Jewish shopkeeper's door was the offense. Without a party card Hans loses customers, a price he goes on paying for years.
Q 26In The Book Thief, Hans calls Liesel 'a good girl' to a visitor who has arrived carrying which book?
Mein Kampf
Mein Kampf is Max's disguise, since a Jew traveling with the Führer's own book draws no second look. Hans supplied the copy, with a house key hidden inside.
Q 27In The Book Thief, what does Liesel say Max Vandenburg's hair looks like, a remark he overhears?
Feathers
Feathers is her comparison, and Max turns it into art: in the story he later paints for her, the hero looks in the mirror and sees a bird.
Q 28In The Book Thief, what does Max daydream of doing to the Führer during his months in hiding?
Boxing him in a ring
Boxing him in a ring is the fantasy, with a biased referee and a whole nation jeering at Max. He loved to fight as a boy, so he prepares with push-ups.
Q 29In The Book Thief, which illustrated story does Max make for Liesel as a late birthday present?
The Standover Man
The Standover Man retells Max's life as a line of figures looming over him, the last and kindest of them a girl. Liesel reads it three times, then falls asleep at his side.
Q 30In The Book Thief, what does Rosa Hubermann serve Max on the night he arrives, her weekly staple?
Pea soup
Pea soup, which Rosa cooks by the potful every week, is what she puts in front of him. Max is so starved that he cannot keep it down.