Prema Weichun
Mrs Jass
CHELA-Per. 4 & 5
18 April 2023
How Prisoners of the Holocaust Found the Will to Live
“Never shall I forget those moments which murdered my God and my soul and turned my dreams to dust”(Wiesel 34). Victims living in the nightmare of the Holocaust watched their families get torn away. They watched their faith crumble to the ground as more and more awful events occurred during the Holocaust. Elie Wiesel was one of these victims who had to go through many traumatic incidents that forever changed his life. He had to take care of his father and try to help him survive, which gave him more of a reason to continue pushing through. Prisoners in concentration camps found the will to continue going through horrific events by holding
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At the beginning of the book Night, Elie cared so much for his dad that feeding him his rations made him feel stronger and happier. An example of Elie looking out for his father is, “Come, Father. It’s better there. You’ll be able to lie down. We’ll take turns. I’ll watch over you and you’ll watch over me. We don’t let each other fall asleep. We’ll look after each other”(Wiesel 89.) However, as time progresses, Elie’s protectiveness over his dad fades and he starts caring about himself more. He realizes that in order to come out of this alive, one can’t be sensitive and they need to care for themselves. Even though he eventually stopped caring for him as much, his dad is what kept him going, so keeping his dad alive is what was keeping him alive. In other words, Elie cared for his father as much as he cared for himself, so that means if he dies, his dad dies. When Elie’s father finally passes, he’s sad that he can’t cry because there’s no tears left to cry. “I did not weep, and it pained me that I could not weep”(Wiesel 112). Despite not crying when his dad died and even feeling a little relieved, knowing that there was still a part of his old life that wasn’t torn away from him was a big motivation to hold
During the early through mid 1940s an event called the Holocaust would plague the European nation where a group of called the “Nazis” would imprison six million Jews, 5 million of them being prisoners of War (The National World War Two Museum). One prisoner named Elie Wiesel would recount his experience going through the Holocaust in his book “Night.” In this book he would show a general theme of Under the most horrifying circumstances, human beings will show tremendous strength, courage, and compassion. The first aspect that supports the theme is humans will show tremendous strength under the most horrifying circumstances.
This act can be seen as empathetic; Elie makes sacrifices for his dad because they rely on each other. In Night, throughout all the complex outcomes, others tried to raise the spirits of the others, which helped them. The memoir reads, "Have faith in life, a thousand times faith. By driving out despair, you will move away from death" (Wiesel 41). One of the characters recognizes the havoc around them, in which he encourages them to keep their heads up.
Elie Wiesel shows how relationships can change as life changes and as time goes by and that you can never take them for granted. On the beginning of the book Elie’s relationship with his father is that of him wanting his father to keep him out of the hands of the Nazis and to keep them alive. When Elie and his family were first taken to the Auschwitz he was very scared and concerned for his family. When he and his father got
With many other Jewish citizens along with his father, Elie was taken to live a long and terrible life in the concentration camps. He had to fight each and every day to survive and be able to live to tell his story of his life during a really hard time. By examining the novel Night, we can
During the journey to Buchenwald and when Elie’s father became ill, Elie and his father’s relationship were challenged. When they were running Wiesel constantly made sure his father was beside him at all times. He also didn’t allow his father fall asleep even if his father was exhausted and desperate for sleep. Elie didn’t want to lose his father during the journey. He fought harder to stay alive for his father.
The fact that Elie has faced such unbelievable cruelty and is present to his father's death shows his ability to persevere and remain hopeful. His only thought was to stay alive and was achievable by overcoming all the hardships he had faced so
Elie has every reason to believe his father would be taken. Elie is becoming much weaker and is unable to work as effectively, yet he no longer regards his own safety as his utmost priority. This is the same Elie who had disobeyed his father’s orders in the past, the same Elie who felt that his father cared more about the community than him. Even after all this, he grows to have his father as such a massive priority for him, that he no longer thinks of his own survival as his number one priority. Elie desperately clings to his father as the last vestige of his former life.
This puts a big strain on their relationship. Elie is forced to take care of his father and make sure his dad is taken care of enough to survive. Elie gets very frustrated with his father for not being able to take care of himself. At one point, Elie even thinks about leaving his father behind to save himself. In this quote, "I could have screamed in anger.
Elie Wiesel experienced a reformation of brokenness in character through external conflicts during his imprisonment at Auschwitz. This brokenness can be seen when he was beaten to the bone for an offense he wasn’t responsible for, evidential on page 55 when Elie said, “It was over, but I didn't realize it for I had fainted.” Although Elie tried to withstand the 25 beatings of the SS soldier, Idek, Elie’s strength couldn’t withhold Idek’s wrath. Elie’s solemn tone and realization that he physically didn’t have enough power to overcome hardships that the camp would bring, begins to settle into Elie’s mindset, even though it was natural for him to revolt against what was inevitable to come. Considering Elie’s young age, the hardships he is already facing and his innocent will to fight against the traumatic experiences that are already coming to him shake his character and morale since he can’t overcome them.
These acts had a lifelong effect on Elie and they changed him forever. Elie Wiesel’s experience through the Holocaust changes him from living a “normal life” to living a life where he is mentally, physically and emotionally stronger because of the struggles
”I did not weep and it pained me the i could not weep. But i was out of tears. And deep inside me, if i could i have searched the recesses of my feeble conscience, i might have found something like: Free at last!... ” When his father died Elie wasn't sad all he could think of was the weight that was lifted off his chest, that he no longer had to be constantly worried or tending on his
Near the beginning of the novel, Elie wanted to be in the same camp with his father more than anything else. The work given to both his father and himself was bearable, but as time passed by, “. . . his father was getting weaker” (107). The weaker Elie’s father got, the more sacrifices Elie made. After realizing the many treatments Elie was giving his father compared to himself, each additional sacrifice made Elie feel as if his “. . .
Elie has to endure being split from his family, being taken away from his home, and then being forced to work until he’s at the brink of death. Although Elie has never been close to his father, that all changes as he is suddenly put in these cruel environments. Eventually Elie’s care for his father grows so much that his only reason to keep working is because of him. This backfires on him as when time goes on his father only grows weaker, both physically and mentally. Elie goes out of his way to help his father thrive instead of himself, and even goes as far as to share the little rations he has with his father.
He was running next to me, out of breath, out of strength, desperate. I had no right to let myself die. What would he do without me? I was his sole support” (Wiesel 86-87). Elie told himself that he had to live because his only family was now his father. Because of this, Elie realized that if he died then his father would be alone and he would lose all of his motivation to keep on going without Elie.
When he says “old familiar fear” it sounds as if he has gotten used to the thought of not losing him. It’s like a vague thought in the back of his head, always telling him that his father is the reason he fights for life day to day. Elie’s father becomes very ill and Elie tries, with all his strength to take care of him. Elie's father dies and he feels a wave of sadness, but can't express it, for example,“I did not weep, and it pained me that I could not weep.” When Elie explains that he couldn't cry, most people would think that he is heartless and that his father may have meant nothing to him.