When The World Was Ours

Content Warning: This section contains descriptions of antisemitism and the Holocaust, including human rights violations, severe abuse, violence, genocide, and gruesome death.

In addition to the connections to their families, the three protagonists are primarily driven by the bonds of friendship, which keep them alive and allow them to remain connected to one another even in death. Leo, Max, and Elsa have a special bond as children and understand one another well. A photograph of the day at the Ferris wheel on Leo’s ninth birthday preserves the memory of this friendship and commemorates the innocence of their childhood belief that they would always be together. Elsa expected to marry Leo or Max, and Max was certain that he would marry Elsa. At the time, the children’s friendship meant everything to them, especially to Max, who had never had friends before and considered their bond to be “as deep and as wide as the Danube itself” (21). Likewise, when Leo is with his friends, he is on top of the world and considers that day to be the best day of his life. In later years, as both Elsa and Leo suffer from the political realities of the Nazi regime, they rely on their family, and this close bond gives them a reason to keep going.