Night By Elie Wiesel Reflection

The book Night, by Elie Wiesel, tells the story of a young Jew named Eliezer who had an extremely similar life to the author himself. The story takes place during the Holocaust and depicts Eliezer’s severe hardships while being held prisoner by the Nazi's in Germany. Throughout Night, Eliezer shares his memories of horror and ill-treatment while being sent to different concentration camps. As a young teenager, Eliezer wholly devoted himself to his faith while living in his home in Hungarian Transylvania. Although at the book’s beginning Eliezer had very strong religious beliefs, the tragic events of the Holocaust left Eliezer struggling with his faith. Throughout the book, Eliezer recounts his life during the Holocaust and the ways in which he struggled to survive all of the trauma and still keep his faith alive. While sharing his memories and stories of hatred and horror, Wiesel tries to show the reader the tremendous darkness of the Holocaust. Even

When the reader possesses this prior knowledge, the story and all of its horrors can be more easily understood. Although I obtained some knowledge of the Holocaust prior to reading the story, I never imagined the extent of cruelty the Jews and other prisoners went through. For example, surprise struck me when Wiesel explained how “the Kapos forced everyone to look him square in the face”(134), referring to a murdered prisoner killed for stealing food to withstand starvation and survive. I can not comprehend how anyone could ever be heartless enough to force another human being to stare into a fellow prisoner’s dead eyes. I noticed from reading the novel that throughout the story there seemed to be immeasurable amounts of resentment and prejudice. I feel notably surprised about this because I do not understand how a person could despise someone they do not even know enough to kill