Night by Eli Wiesel

“Night” by Eli Wiesel is a memoir type book based on true events that occurred in the holocaust. The Narrator for this story is Elizer (Eli Wiesel’s character in the book) and his tale begins in the town of Sighet, Hungary. This is where Elizer was raised from birth along with his three sisters; Hilda, Béa, Tzipora. In the spring of 1944 the Nazi’s would invade Germany and force all the Jews to live on ghetto then shortly after to Auschwitz. In Auschwitz Elizer and his dad Cholmo were separated form the rest of his family and sent to do work. In the Time Elizer had made friends in this tough time but as the story progress some of them were either sent to the gas chamber or hung for being in the Buna rebellion. After months in the Concentration camp Elizer injures his foot and was sent to the infirmary for an operation. While he was there the Nazi’s decided to make a 50 mile dash to escape the incoming Russians because they were going to liberate the Buna. The route the prisoners had to follow was being bombarded by a blizzard and was covered in snow many people died from exhaustion and the exposure to the harsh whether. By the time the time Elizer had his father had reached the train there were only few other Jews riding with them. Shortly after Elizer and his father arrived in Buchenwald, Elizer’s father dies because of dysentery and physical abuse. Then on April 11 1945 Elizer is released because the American’s liberated
There are two important themes that seem to stick out the most in this book; Faith and Inhumanity. Before the holocaust Elizer and his family seem to be quite involved with their faith seeing as Elizer was studying the five books of the old testament and reading the Tora. As the story progresses Elizer begins to lose his faith in god because he believes if there really was a god why isn’t he doing anything to help save him and his fellow Jewish comrades in the struggle. The other theme is inhumanity; the reason being is that the Nazi’s are trying to wipe out a whole part of the human race for no reason. Jewish people are humans and are part of the human race and to try and conduct genocide is the most inhumane thing that can be done. Also the way some of the Jews were treated and torture made it evident hat inhumanity was there.
The way the book was written was a memoir style type story narrated by Elizer himself, the speech, language, and vocabulary made this book appropriate for all ages of thirteen and above.
Some issues that were raised in the book that might pertain to me personally was when Elizer and his dad were split up from the rest of his family. When I was ten years old my dad came home and was really angry about some issue and he ran away for a couple of days and I was afraid I would never see him again and I thought I would have to adjust to life without a father. Just like how Elizer had to adjust to his life without the rest of his family besides his dad.
No I haven’t found any similarities to what we have discussed in class thus far.
The author could have improved this book by getting more opinions on other people such as the Nazi’s that didn’t want to be the ones torturing the Jews and other peoples perspective other then Elizer’s. I would also highly recommend this book to others to get a sense of how the holocaust affected Jews at the time.
Silence and fire seem to have a lot of symbolism in this book. When Elizer says “Never shall I forget that nocturnal silence which deprived me, for all eternity, of the desire to live.” This is what he says after the realization of how he and others have lost their faith in God because when there was a hanging the presence of God is questioned and then everything fell silent. The reason Fire is depicted as a key aspect of symbolism is because fire is known in the Jewish religion to be god’s way inflicting wrath in hell. Instead the Nazi’s are using fire as a weapon to over power the Jews and causes even the good to die by the flames. This is another contribution to how Elizer is losing faith in his Jewish religion