Germany, the garden it once was.

[zevgreen]

"The wagtail hops from twig to twig.  Werner rubs his aching eyes.  It's just a bird.  'Ten thousand years ago,' whispers Fredrick, 'they came through here in the millions.  When this place was a garden, one endless garden from end to end.'"

This quote, from when Werner was visiting Fredrick's house in Berlin, is a simile. It likens Germany to the garden that it once was, before Hitler came into power, and people like Fredrick (bookish and not necessarily athletic) were treated just as well as everyone else.  However, under Hitler, the ideal Aryan is fit and athletic.  Fredrick does not fit this model (he is viewed as the weakest cadet in the corps) and he is beat up and bullied by the other cadets.

What prevents Fredrick from doing things that would make him fit in with the rest of the cadets, such as dumping the water on the prisoner?  Why does he chose not to just go along with whatever he is wanted to do, instead of standing out more than he already does?  

[ninaseidel]

Despite being shy, Frederick seemed to have a strong set of principles which he stuck to, unlike Werner who frequently gave into pressure from his peers. Frederick's combination of physical weakness and desire to not participate in the other boys' brutal behavior meant that he should never have ended up at the school. At many points during the book, I found myself wondering why Frederick would not just go along with the crowd to avoid being singled out by his teachers and his peers. I think it comes down to him having strong convictions despite his apparent meekness.