Refugee

Although the central themes of Refugee are explored in the context of each child’s individual story, one general theme cuts across all three storylines. Josef, Isabel, and Mahmoud each undertake a journey toward a better life because all three children have suffered disruption in their homelands. In following their separate migrations, the reader comes to realize that the concept of a safe haven isn’t dependent on geography. Places perceived as secure during one historic period become places to avoid during another time.

Josef flees Germany for Cuba because Cuba is both stable and safe during the 1930s. Ironically, Isabel flees Josef’s promised land of Cuba to seek refuge in America because Castro’s leadership has made that same country perilous in the 1990s. Mahmoud’s flight from Syria to Germany in 2015 is equally ironic: Nazi Germany in the 1940s would have been a dangerous place for anyone not of Aryan descent.

The journey to a better life seems to depend less on geographic safe havens than on the determination of the people making the trip. All three children exploit every meager resource at their command to accomplish that goal. Josef controls his father’s psychosis long enough to pass a quarantine inspection.