Imagine; you are stripped of your identity and obliged to conform to the others of your exact situation. You are continually being monitored in an isolated area. The restrictions placed by your tormentors are precise and harsh and if you do not obey, you are punished beyond the simple yell in the face or slap of the hand. You endure this lifestyle for weeks and weeks, over time you begin to change both physically and mentally. Your weight has drastically plummeted and you have begun to lose hope in an exit. At this point you are desperate for a solution to your problems, resulting is assumably regrettable actions. All of which you have just read was what prisoners during the Holocaust had to face in concentration camps. In the memoir Night, …show more content…
written by Elie Wiesel, Elie writes about his first-hand accounts in the camps.
At the beginning of the memoir, World War ll is at the beginning of its stages and soon Elie and his family are swept away from their home in Sighetu by the Hungarian police and sent to live in the harsh conditions of the concentration …show more content…
camps. There is a limited supply of basic human needs which forces Elie and the rest of the prisoners to act upon survival. The prisoners continue this way of living until the desperation for a less troubled life begins to control their thoughts. The result is children purposely abandoning their fathers, sons killing fathers for bread, and selfish ways of thinking. The cause of such erratic behavior is due to the extreme conditions the prisoners endured from those in command of the concentration camps such as the abuse, neglect, and persecution. The first indication of this behavior is demonstrated when a father begins to plead with his son with mercy as to not kill him for a piece of bread he has. The father shouted, “Meir. Meir, my boy! Don’t you recognize me? I’m your father… you’re hurting me… you’re killing your father! I’ve got some bread… for you too… for you too…” (113). This quote takes place near the end of the book, close to the camp’s end and the desperation from the beginning had grown immensely. The food was, at this point of endurance, more important than family due to the neglect of the officials. The importance of being able to have something to satisfy their needs of hunger and face the day tomorrow was all that mattered to the prisoners. They did whatever was needed to be done in order to survive, even if that included the unspeakable, betrayal. Furthermore, a similar circumstance is told by Elie when Rabbi Eliahou searches for his son, who left his father behind during the Death March. “A terrible through loomed up in my mind: he had wanted to get rid of his father! He had felt that his father was growing weak, he had believed that the end was near and had sought this separation in order to get rid of the burden…My God, Lord of the Universe, give me strength never to do what Rabbi Eliahou’s son has done” (90-91). Rabbi Eliahou’s son had felt necessary to abandon his father because he wanted to get rid of him. The burden of carrying around another when you have weaknesses yourself pushed his son to leave and forget his troubles behind. Family didn’t seem to be as important as it was when compared to being able to defend yourself and if that meant leaving to not take care of someone anymore, then so be it. A final example would be when Elie himself begins to feel thoughts of selfishness. After waking up, he becomes worried about his sick father and begins to search for him in hopes to never even find him. “Don’t let me find him! If only I could get rid of this dead weight, so that I could use all my strength to struggle for my own survival, and only worry about myself. Immediately I felt ashamed of myself, ashamed forever” (118). After his father had become weak, timid, and vulnerable, was when Elie began to think this way. It was no longer about caring for others but more of every man for himself. Elie’s desperation led him to thoughts of hoping not find his father just so that he wouldn’t have to take care of him anymore. Conditions were harsh enough to make Elie not wish to fend for anyone but himself. So for all these reasons, son killing father for a small amounts of bread just to satisfy their hunger, son abandoning their father in hopes of a lighter responsibility, and son wishing to find father dead to only take care of himself, one can see that the cruelty fathers received from their sons was truly heartbreaking.
All started when fathers and sons were taken to concentration camps; with limited rations of basic human necessities, prisoners were left with no choice but to do whatever was required to in order to survive. No limitations were constructed of how far prisoners could go, they just proceeded with however they pleased, leading to the horrifying actions such as the ones stated above. These conditions of the camps were so awful that it changed the prisoners into erratic savages that would do anything to live. Their desperation was the base for their cruelty. The prisoners let greed and their needs come before having compassion and the well-being of others. The Holocaust serves as a reminder to humanity of what can happen when the abuse of power goes too
far.
In his first account in the story, he is a young boy of 13 years, in the small town of Sighet, Transylvania; In Hungary. He is very religious and is ready to learn more about his faith. It is 1941, when some Jews are taken from Sighet. Years pass until Elie is 15 years old now; Hitler is hovering above European Jewish citizens with a iron fist. With the laws passed in Germany, the Holocaust begins, and The Germans invade foreign land in an attempt to purify the Aryan race. Germans appear in Sighet, and are polite and kind and take residence in multiple families homes. Slowly overtime Jews were labeled, then segregated into ghettos. Soon after Elie and his family learns of the transports to the labor camps. They are then transported; through this misfortune and grief, Elie loses his faith in god, and loses hope. This is where the story truly begins, in the labor camp of Birkenau. Elie and his father were stripped of all their possessions and given painful haircuts, as well as clothes equivalent by those of rags; Here the people are worked like dogs and Elie now endures the pain of the labor camps, both emotionally and physically. He loses sight of his mother and sister who are
One might treat others like beast, but is the treated consider human? The novel Night is an autobiography written by Elie Wiesel. He explains the dehumanization process of his family, Elizer, and his fellow Jews throughout WWII. Throughout the novel the Jews changes from civilized humans to vicious beings that have behavior that resembles animal. The process of dehumanization begins after the arrestation of the Jew community leaders. The process continues through the bad treatment given by the Nazi to the Jews, in the concentration camps. Finally the Jews are dehumanized to the point where they begins to go against each other; so that they could have a higher chance of survival, at the end where the Jew were forced to move from camp to camp.
Six million Jews died during World War II by the Nazi army under Hitler who wanted to exterminate all Jews. In Night, Elie Wiesel, the author, recalls his horrifying journey through Auschwitz in the concentration camp. This memoir is based off of Elie’s first-hand experience in the camp as a fifteen year old boy from Sighet survives and lives to tell his story. The theme of this memoir is man's inhumanity to man. The cruel events that occurred to Elie and others during the Holocaust turned families and others against each other as they struggled to survive Hitler's and the Nazi Army’s inhumane treatment.
The author of the book Night , Elie Wiesel, explains his life, as well as his fellow Jews, as a young Jewish boy in concentration camps. The Jews who were sent to concentration camps were put under extremely harsh conditions and were treated like nothing but animals while under the control of the Germans. Wiesel illustrates a picture of these horrific events in his book NIght. He also describes the gruesome conditions the Jews were forced through while under the power of the Germans.
In the beginning of the novel, Elie’s father Shlomo Wiesel is a respected Jewish community leader in Sighet. He was held in the highest esteem by the community and his advice and knowledge was frequently sought (Wiesel 22). Unfortunately, Shlomo Wiesel made the same mistake as other Jews, and decided to ignore the warnings about the Nazis. Before everything started, Elie even asked his father to sell everything and move to Palestine, but his father told him, “I am too old, my son, too old to start a new life. Too old to start from scratch in some distant land…”(Wiesel 27) . Soon after, the Nazis come into Sighet and formed two ghettos. While been in the smaller ghetto waiting to be moved, the Wiesel’s family former maid, Maria, offers to hide the family in her village, but once again Elie’s father declines the opportunity.
Everyday, we go through situations and experiences that affect us in someway, perhaps even change us. Different situations have different effects. The more difficult the situation is, the more of an effect it has on us. Those hard times can be called adversity. How do we, as humans, react to adversity? What are the possible effects it may have?
Elie Wiesel, a Jewish boy, lives in Sighet during World War II with his mother, father, and two sisters, and he is very religious and wanted to study Judaism. However, there were warnings by some people that Jewish people were being deported and killed. Although no one believes these warnings, Elie and his family are taken to a ghetto where they have no food. After being in the ghetto Elie and his father are separated from Elie’s mother and sister because of selection and were placed in cattle cars where they had no room. They are taken to Auschwitz where they suffer from hunger, beatings, and humiliation from the guards which causes Elie’s father to become weak. By now Elie loses his faith in God because of all he has been through. Lastly, Elie’s father dies just before the Jews are liberated and Elie sees his reflection in the mirror but does not recognize himself because he looks like a skeleton.
According to the definition, inhumane is described as an individual without compassion for misery or sufferings. The novel Night by the author Elie Wiesel, illustrates some aspects of inhumanity throughout the book. It is evident in the novel that when full power is given to operate without restraint, the person in power becomes inhumane. There are many examples of inhumanity in this novel. For instance, "Never shall I forget that smoke. Never shall I forget the little faces of the children, whose bodies I saw turned into wreaths of smoke beneath a silent blue sky." Through this quote Elie is explaining his first night at camp and what he saw will be in his head forever - unforgettable. In my opinion, the section in the novel when the Germans throw the babies into the chimney is very inhuman. An individual must feel no sympathy or feelings in order to take such a disturbing action. In addition to that "For more than half an hour stayed there, struggling between life and death, dying in slow agony under our eyes. And we had to look him full in the face. He was still alive when I passed in front of him. His tongue was still red, his eyes were not yet glazed." This is also very inhumane example since the child's weight wasn’t enough to snap his neck when he was hung and so he is slowly dying painful death as all Jewish people walk by him, being forced to watch the cruelty.
The significance of night throughout the novel Night by Elie Wiesel shows a poignant view into the daily life of Jews throughout the concentration camps. Eliezer describes each day as if there was not any sunshine to give them hope of a new day. He used the night to symbolize the darkness and eeriness that were brought upon every Jew who continued to survive each day in the concentration camps. However, night was used as an escape from the torture Eliezer and his father had to endure from the Kapos who controlled their barracks. Nevertheless, night plays a developmental role of Elie throughout he novel.
It is reported that over 6 million Jews were brutally murdered in the Holocaust, but there were a very few who were able to reach the liberation, and escape alive. There were many important events that occurred in Elie Wiesel’s Night, and for each and every event, I was equally, if not more disturbed than the one before. The first extremely disturbing event became a reality when Eliezer comprehended that there were trucks filled with babies that the Nazi’s were throwing the children into the crematorium. Unfortunately, the sad truth of the murdering babies was clearly presented through, “Not far from us, flames, huge flames, were rising from a ditch. Something was being burned there, […] babies”, (Wiesel, Night, 32). This was one of the most disturbing events of the narrative for myself and truly explained the cruelty and torture of the Holocaust.
“He’s the man who’s lived through hell without every hating. Who’s been exposed to the most depraved aspects of human nature but still manages to find love, to believe in God, to experience joy.” This was a quote said by Oprah Winfrey during her interview with Elie Wiesel, a holocaust survivor. No person who has not experienced the Holocaust and all its horrors could ever relate to Elie Wiesel. He endured massive amounts of torture, physically, mentally, and emotionally just because he was a Jew. One simple aspect of Wiesel’s life he neither chose or could changed shaped his life. It is important to take a look at Wiesel’s life to see the pain that he went through and try to understand the experiences that happened in his life. Elie Wiesel is a well respected, influential figure with an astonishing life story. Although Elie Wiesel had undergone some of the harshest experiences possible, he was still a man able to enjoy life after the Holocaust.
In the memoir, Night, Elie Wiesel remembers his time at Auschwitz during the Holocaust. Elie begins to lose his faith in God after his faith is tested many times while at the concentration camp. Elie conveys to us how horrific events have changed the way he looks at his faith and God. Through comments such as, “Never shall I forget those moments which murdered my God, my soul, and turned my dreams into dust,” he reveals the toll that the Holocaust has taken on him. The novel begins during the years of 1942-1944 in Sighet, Transylvannia, Romania. Elie Wiesel and his family are deported and Elie is forced to live through many horrific events. Several events such as deportation, seeing dead bodies while at Auschwitz, and separation from his mother and sisters, make Elie start to question his absolute faith in God.
When World War 2 started, Elie Wiesel was a young boy in Sighet, Transylvania. Elie has begun to lose faith in man, and in his God which he looked up to for everything. There are multiple occurrences and obstacles in what is going on in his life that lead to him lose faith. Furthermore, the different types of experiences are what shape him to what he is in the end.
Elie’s loss of innocence and childhood lifestyle is very pronounced within the book, Night. This book, written by the main character, Elie Wiesel, tells the readers about the experiences of Mr. Wiesel during the Holocaust. The book starts off by describing Elie’s life in his hometown, Sighet, with his family and friends. As fascism takes over Hungary, Elie and his family are sent north, to Auschwitz concentration camp. Elie stays with his father and speaks of his life during this time. Later, after many stories of the horrors and dehumanizing acts of the camp, Elie and his father make the treacherous march towards Gliewitz. Then they are hauled to Buchenwald by way of cattle cars in extremely deplorable conditions, even by Holocaust standards. The book ends as Elie’s father is now dead and the American army has liberated them. As Elie is recovering in the hospital he gazes at himself in a mirror, he subtly notes he much he has changed. In Night by Elie Wiesel, Elie loses his innocence and demeanour because he was traumatized by what he saw in the camps, his loss of faith in a God who stood idly by while his people suffered, and becoming selfish as he is forced to become selfish in the death camps to survive.
Elie goes to Auschwitz at an innocent, young stage in his life. Due to his experiences at this concentration camp, he loses his faith, his bond with his father, and his innocence. Situations as horrendous as the Holocaust will drastically change people, no matter what they were like before the event, and this is evident with Elie's enormous change throughout the memoir Night.