In Night, Elie Wiesel survives an attempted genocide many have heard of but few truly known, the Holocaust. Elie Wiesel doesn’t know how he survived saying, “I was weak, rather shy; I did nothing to save myself,” (p. vii). However, he knows his survival and testimony has placed him as a, “witness who believes he has a moral obligation to try to prevent the enemy from enjoying one last victory by allowing his crimes to be erased from human memory,” (p. viii). What follows is a summary of Elie’s auto-biography Night that seeks to answer whether or not it is effective as a witness of the Holocaust; a comparison of the power of one voice versus statistics; and an inquiry as to what extent this account of individuals struggling to survive impacts …show more content…
One can get overwhelmed by the magnitude of statistics in history. One such statistic being: “Jewish victims of the Holocaust… Total Loss 5, 820, 960,” (http://faculty.ucc.edu/egh-damerow/statistics/htm). It is easy to forget that an individual story can voice a shared experience. Elie did not see 5,820,960 deaths but he felt them and portrayed them. Six million voices can be heard as Elie cries, “Never shall I forget that night…that smoke…those flames that…turned my dreams to ashes,” (pg.34). He sees babies thrown into open flames, boys hung for petty crimes, starvation, and the loss of hope in every direction. Through his voice humanity is …show more content…
This account of Jewish survival is at once depressing, excruciatingly so. Unrelenting abuse and unspeakable crimes constantly bombard the reader. How does one feel having read it? Sick? Furthermore even Elie, a survivor, says, “My soul had been invaded -and devoured- by a black flame (pg.37)…my life… no longer mattered (pg.113).” Hope seems lost in this story. Then I remember Elie speaking of the first human words he heard in the camps. A young pole said, “Ahead of you lies a long road paved with suffering. Don’t lose hope…Have faith in life, a thousand times faith…Hell does not last forever… Help each other that is the only way to survive (pg.41).” These words stand out in a world of terror. They seem foreign. Yet they capture the heart of a people who hope, who have faith. They demand attention and I find myself stopping to ponder the strength of character it would take to practice these words. I feel spellbound and in awe by the bravery shown in the face of death by these people struggling to
Night, written by Elie Wiesel, is a book that recounts the author's experiences as a Jewish teenager during the Holocaust. This book is intresting because it shows people who have never experienced or learned about the Holocaust the horrors of it. It shows poeple why history should never repeat and why people should tell there story. What would you do if history repeated and there was another Holocaust? In this essay, I will analyze and evaluate the effectiveness of the rhetorical strategies used by Wiesel to achieve his purpose, including his central idea, intended audience, and message, as well as his use of ethos, pathos, and logos throughout the book.
In the memoir “Night” by Elie Wiesal, Wiesal himself is explaining his story, and personal experiences from the Holocaust of 1933-1945. This event is one of the most unbelievable times in history. Elie tells his story, in hopes that it will prevent history from repeating itself. The Jews went through not just internal hell, but had to live it everyday. They were treated like objects, animals, and nonentities.
"Those who kept silent yesterday will remain silent tomorrow." (Wiesel, xiii) So ends the original Yiddish version of Night, with this sad but true vicious cycle, that Eliezer “Elie” Wiesel has broken with his traumatic memoir. He shows the world could not and should not forget the Holocaust, no matter how many sleepless nights or fiery flashbacks it causes, lest it happen again. Way before the tragic events were even being thought of, he was a studious child who lived in the safe and pious town of Sighet.
It is difficult for a person to have strong faith while they are going through something so traumatic. It was beginning to get difficult for Elie to have faith in God. “For God’s sake, where is God?” Elie and many other prisoners began questioning their God.
Elie Wiesel succeeded in demonstrating the horrors of the Holocaust and the period of time which “would be judged one day.” He exceeded in being the “bear witness” to the Holocaust and he did not remain
The Holocaust is a destruction on a massive scale, it was significant part of today’s history because it teaches people how and where genocide can take place in. Although, the violence was targeted towards the Jewish people, non-Jewish people were also killed during this traumatizing event of world history. The memoir Night by Eliezer Wiesel tells the story about Elie’s Holocaust experiences. In his story, Elie experiences and encounters several relationships involving himself and other characters. The theme relationships are essential for physical and psychological survival are shown throughout the book when situations involving Mrs. Schächter, Stein, and Elie occur.
The heart wrenching and powerful memoir “Night” by Elie Wiesel depicts Elie’s struggle through the holocaust. It shows the challenges and struggles Elie and people like him faced during this mournful time, the dehumanization; being forced out of their homes, their towns and sent to nazi concentration camps, being stripped of their belongings and valuables, being forced to endure and witness the horrific events during one of history’s most ghastly tales. In “Night” Elie does not only endure a physical journey but also a spiritual journey as well, this makes him question his determination, faith and strength. This spiritual journey is a journey of self discovery and is shown through Elie’s struggle with himself and his beliefs, his father
Elie Wiesel’s memoir Night tells the personal tale of his account of the inhumanity and brutality the Nazis showed during the Holocaust. Night depicts the story of a young Jew from the small town of Sighet named Eliezer. Wiesel and his family are deported to the concentration camp known as Auschwitz. He must learn to survive with his father’s help until he finds liberation from the horror of the camp. This memoir, however, hides a greater lesson that can only be revealed through careful analyzation.
The Holocaust was one of the most tragic events in history. It just so happened to be the cause of six million deaths. While there are countless beings who experienced such trauma, it is impossible to hear everyone's side of the story. However, one man, in particular, allowed himself to speak of the tragedies. Elie Wiesel addressed the transformation he underwent during the Holocaust in his memoir, Night.
Through character’s hope and perseverance in his memoir Night, Elie Wiesel conveys the theme that the love one holds for another is what fuels their will survive under strain. The Jews displacement by the Nazi’s downgraded them from their homes to filthy, plague-ridden, sewer like boxes of concrete that was Auschwitz. As a result of this many forgot their purpose to be alive. Wiesel shows that the need to survive those conditions was only supported by a sense of duty to one’s family to be there. When Stein says “Were it not for them, I would give up,”(45) he shows that their survival is the only thing keeping him upright.
Throughout one’s experiences in life, one has endured so much pain, so many hardships, that it is nearly incomprehensible to not lose hope. In the book, Night, by Elie Wiesel, Elie himself experiences the most horrific idea of the century, the bane of Jewish society; the holocaust. The holocaust was a rigorous attempt made by Adolf Hitler and Nazi Germany to eliminate the entirety of the Jewish people, who he blamed for his country’s misfortune and poor condition. Elie depicts his entire journey as he struggles to survive throughout his book, and at the same time shows the agony of his and the other prisoners. In the book, Night, Elie Wiesel shows the segregation of Jews from numerous objects, the fear created in the camp from multiple methods,
To find a man who has not experienced suffering is impossible; to have man without hardship is equally unfeasible. Such trials are a part of life and assert that one is alive by shaping one’s character. In the autobiographical memoir Night by Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel, this molding is depicted through Elie’s transformation concerning his identity, faith, and perspective. As a young boy, Elie and his fellow neighbors of Sighet, Romania were sent to Auschwitz, a macabre concentration camp with the sole motive of torturing and killing Jews like himself. There, Elie experiences unimaginable suffering, and upon liberation a year later, leaves as a transformed person.
Very few books illustrate the suffering endured in World War II concentration camps as vividly as Elie Wiesel's Night. It is a memoire that will leave disturbing mental images of famine, anti-Semitism, and death such as infants being shoveled as
In a span of 10 years, the Holocaust killed over 7 million people, that’s just as much as the population of Hong Kong. In the book Night, by Elie Wiesel, Wiesel shares his experience on how he survived the Holocaust and what he went through. How he dealt with the horrors and even to how he felt of his dad’s death and how he saw himself after it was all over. As he tried to publish it he was constantly turned down due to the fact of how horrid and truful it was. He still tried and tried until it was finally published.
It is a common assumption among numerous people in the world that the Holocaust never existed. In fact, almost fifty percent of the world population never even heard of the Holocaust. Elie Wiesel helped people around the world learn about the Holocaust through his book “Night.” He wanted people to see the bravery, courage, and guilt of the Jews through his book. “Night” shows the horrific and malicious acts in the German concentration camps during the Holocaust.