Jay Patel 4th Period Honors English II Ms. Austin 26 October 2023 Silenced by Shadows: Unveiling Oppression in Night. Imagine the unimaginable: stripped of humanity, crammed into a cattle car, and driven for days without sustenance. This nightmarish ordeal was the reality for millions during the Holocaust. Elie Wiesel, a survivor of the Holocaust, describes his horrific ordeal and his experiences as a teen in great detail through the eye-opening memoir, Night. Wiesel, a fifteen-year-old boy in Sighet, Transylvania (modern-day Romania), endured unspeakable horrors in concentration camps after being taken by soldiers, including bereavement, abuse, and extreme starvation. This narrative employs numerous literary devices that connect to the theme …show more content…
In one instance, when everyone arrived at the Auschwitz camp for the first time, they received the brilliant news, “There was a labor camp on site”. The conditions were good, and the weather was good. Families would not be separated.” (Wiesel 27). This quote demonstrates irony due to the fact that later in this novel, they receive treatment opposite to what they had expected, treatment worse than the rest of the camps and experiences they have ever faced in their lives. None of these conditions were met in the slightest; instead, they were further dehumanized and subjected to more torture. Additional instances of irony in Wiesel’s writing can be found here. On one occasion, Wiesel and the other prisoners were marching between two barracks, and the ones who fell behind in the march were beaten brutally. Inscriptions everywhere stated, ‘WARNING! DANGER OF DEATH!’, where in response to reading this sign, Elie comments, “Was there here a single place where one was not in danger of death?” (Wiesel 40). This quote proves the extreme irony of warning someone about something that is already apparent in this context: certain death, revealing the severe oppression imposed on these unfortunate victims. Elie Wiesel’s use of figurative language significantly emphasizes the intense agony and misery he and the other victims faced in the tormenting concentration camps, during one of the darkest and cruelest times in history. Wiesel uses various examples of personification, to compare human characteristics to his experiences in the Holocaust, as in his statement of death ‘suffocating’ him, expressing the intensity and cruelty of his final march. He provides numerous examples of similes to make striking comparisons, to express the dehumanizing treatment they received, as in the comparison of ‘rags’ to how these workers were
In the book Night by Elie Wiesel there were countless acts that would be classified as inhuman. For example the hanging of an angelic pipel, or killing one’s father for a piece of bread. Although both acts are extremely inhuman, hanging a child is more inhuman than killing one’s father for a piece of bread. Yet, to kill someone’s father for a bread is more in keeping with human nature in the fact that it is done for survival.
Elie wiesel born sep 30 1928 in sighet , Transylvania. Elie wiesel overcame many things in his life . But one of the things are fear that he will die also there was starvation that took place and that is the most terriblest thing that can happen. Also there was death of the many jews and his mother and sisters. These adversities made Wiesel become the man he is today; he is truly a humanitarian.
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.
Throughout the Holocaust, the Jews were continuously dehumanized by the Nazis. However, these actions may not have only impacted the Jews, but they may have had the unintended effect of dehumanizing the Nazis as well. What does this say about humanity? Elie Wiesel and Art Spiegelman both acknowledge this commentary in their books, Night and Maus. The authors demonstrate that true dehumanization reveals that the nature of humanity is not quite as structured as one might think.
In Elie Wiesel’s Night, he recounts his horrifying experiences as a Jewish boy under Nazi control. His words are strong and his message clear. Wiesel uses themes such as hunger and death to vividly display his days during World War II. Wiesel’s main purpose is to describe to the reader the horrifying scenes and feelings he suffered through as a repressed Jew. His tone and diction are powerful for this subject and envelope the reader. Young readers today find the actions of Nazis almost unimaginable. This book more than sufficiently portrays the era in the words of a victim himself.
One of the most significant metaphors occurs at the end of the novel. Shortly after Eliezer is rescued from the concentration camp, he sees his reflection for the first time since he has been invaded by the Nazis. Wiesel states in his novel, “He looks in the mirror and sees the face of a corpse staring back at him” (Tackach 3980). This is an extremely powerful message as Wiesel is demonstrating how the soul of every Jew died from what they experienced during the Holocaust. Most Jews could never look at themselves as the same person again. Wiesel uses this metaphor to illustrate the significant change that the concentration camps caused to each victim
A story of a young boy and his father as they are stolen from their home in Transylvania and taken through the most brutal event in human history describes the setting. This boy not only survived the tragedy, but went on to produce literature, in order to better educate society on the truth of the Holocaust. In Night, the author, Elie Wiesel, uses imagery, diction, and foreshadowing to describe and define the inhumanity he experienced during the Holocaust.
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.
Dehumanization Through Elie Wiesel Elie Wiesel’s memoir Night, is an account about his experience through concentration camps and death marches during WWII. In 1944, fifteen year old Wiesel was one of the many Jews forced onto cattle cars and sent to death and labor camps. Their personal rights were taken from them, as they were treated like animals. Millions of men, women, children, Jews, homosexuals, Gypsies, disabled people, and Slavic people had to face the horrors the Nazi’s had planned for them. Many people witnessed and lived through beatings, murders, and humiliations.
It is so strenuous to be faithful when you are a walking cadaver and all you can think of is God. You devote your whole life to Him and he does not even have the mercy set you free. At the concentration camp, many people were losing faith. Not just in God, but in themselves too. Elie Wiesel uses many literary devices, including tone, repetition and irony to express the theme, loss of faith. He uses tone by quoting men at the camp and how they are craving for God to set them free. He also uses repetition. He starts sentences with the same opening, so that it stays in the reader’s head. Finally, he uses irony to allude to loss of faith. Elie understands how ironic it is to praise someone so highly, only to realize they will not have mercy on you. In Night, Elie Wiesel uses tone, repetition and irony illustrate the loss of faith the prisoners were going through.
Authors sometimes refer to their past experiences to help cope with the exposure to these traumatic events. In his novel Night, Elie Wiesel recalls the devastating and horrendous events of the Holocaust, one of the world’s highest points for man’s inhumanity towards man, brutality, and cruel treatment, specifically towards the Jewish Religion. His account takes place from 1944-1945 in Germany while beginning at the height of the Holocaust and ending with the last years of World War II. The reader will discover through this novel that cruelty is exemplified all throughout Wiesel's, along with the other nine million Jews’, experiences in the inhumane concentration camps that are sometimes referred to as “death factories.”
Night by Elie Wiesel is an autobiographical novel recording Mr. Wiesel’s experiences during the World War II holocaust. As a 15 year old boy Elie was torn from his home and placed in a concentration camp. He and his father were separated from his mother and his sisters. It is believed that they were put to death in the fiery pits of Auschwitz. The entire story is one of calm historical significance while there is a slight separation between the emotional trauma of what are occurring, and the often-detached voice of the author.
In this tiny novel, you will get to walk right into a gruesome nightmare. If only then, it was just a dream. You would witness and feel for yourself of what it is like to go through the unforgettable journey that young Eliezer Wiesel and his father had endured in the greatest concentration camp that shook the history of the entire world. With only one voice, Eliezer Wiesel’s, this novel has been told no better. Elie's voice will have you emotionally torn apart. The story has me questioning my own wonders of how humanity could be mistreated in such great depths and with no help offered.
When people are placed in difficult, desolate situations, they often change in a substantial way. In Night by Elie Wiesel, the protagonist, Elie, is sent to the Auschwitz concentration camp where he undergoes many devastating experiences. Due to these traumatic events, Elie changes drastically, losing his passion in God, becoming disconnected with his father, and maturing when it matters most.