Night By Elie Wiesel Analysis

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1. “The student of Talmud, the child I was, had been consumed by the flames. All that was left was a shape that resembled me. My soul had been invaded—and devoured—by a black flame” (Wiesel 37). Using a combination of language patterns, Eliezer is able to expertly command the emotions of the reader, somehow knowing precisely when a piece of figurative language is necessary. Fire, being one of the main motifs of “Night,” appears repeatedly throughout the book, but this metaphor caught my attention. The reader is already introduced to the idea of the physical burning of a person through the crematorium, and yet Eliezer bring it back up, instead touching on the metaphorical, mental damage the flames these Nazis stoked has caused for him. The trauma he suffers in Auschwitz goes beyond the physical—starvation, dehydration, injuries—of suffering, because while there he lost the “student of Talmud,” his faith, and lost the “child [he] was,” his youth and …show more content…

He cares very much for his father, enough so that he cannot be swayed by the desperation of hunger or survival, as shown when he says, “Too late to save your old father… You could have two rations of bread, two rations of soup… It was only a fraction of a second, but it left me feeling guilty” (Wiesel 111). While he does falter, his love for his father ultimately wins out, even though the logical thing to do would be to take advantage of his father’s uneaten rations. Their time together made them closer, evidenced by how Eliezer’s one, constant thought was to stick with his father and by Wiesel’s father’s last words. Surrounded by other families whose members have betrayed each other for something as measly as a crust of bread, it was a testament to the strength of their relationship that they did not fall prey to that

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