Book Report on Elie Wiesel's Night
Elie tells of his hometown, Sighet, and of Moshe the Beadle. He tells of his family and his three sisters, Hilda, Béa, and the baby of the family, Tzipora. Elie is taught the cabala by Moshe the Beadle. Moshe is taken away and sees an entire train of people murdered by the Gestapo. He returns to Sighet and tries to warn them, but no one believes his story. The Nazis come and take over Sighet. Elie is moved to a ghetto, along with all the other Jews in Sighet. They soon are taken away in a train to Auschwitz.
INTERESTING WORDS:
Nobody ever felt ENCUMBERED by his presence. (Burdened)
Maimonides said it was only at thirty that one had the right to venture into the perilous world of MYSTICISM. (Religious studies)
This year was a year like any other, with its springtime, its BETROTHALS, its weddings, and birth. (Engagements)
There are ANTI-SEMITIC incidents every day, in the streets, in the trains. (Anti-Jew)
Section 2
A large number of Jews are forced into a train car. The ride is very cramped and uncomfortable. A woman called Madame Shächter starts shouting about a fire that she can see every night. Her little boy clings to her and cries. Eventually the Jews tie her, gag her, and even hit her. They finally make it to Auschwitz at what seemed to be midnight, and see the flames Madame Shächter was yelling about. A tall crematory spewing flames and smoke loomed over them.
INTERESTING WORDS:
An SS noncommissioned officer came to meet us, a TRUNCHEON in his hand. (Club)
We’ve got to REVOLT. (Rebel)
We started to eat our last PROVISIONS. (Rations)
Section 3
Elie and his father are separated from Elie’s mother and little sister, never to be seen again. Elie comes face to face with the Angel of Death as he is marched to the edge of a crematory, but is put in a barracks instead. Elie’s faith briefly faltered at this moment. They are forced to strip down, but to keep their belt and shoes. They run to the barber and get their hair clipped off and any body hair shaved. Many of the Jews rejoice to see the others that have made it. Others weep for the ones lost. They then get prison clothes that were ridiculously fitted. They made exchanges and went to a new barracks in the “gypsies’ camp.” They wait in the mud for a long time. They were permitted to another barracks, with a gypsy in charge of them. They are ...
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...ferent person. Her eyes were shut and her mouth was gaping as she spasmodically gasped for air.
“And even when we were no longer hungry, there was still no one who thought of revenge.” p. 109
I chose this passage because it amazes me that after all they had suffered, after all the unnecessary hardships the Nazis made them suffer, no one had a though of revenge.
“From the depths of the mirror, a corpse gazed back at me.” p. 109
I chose this passage because it reminds me of a time when I was sick and I had eaten hardly anything and had gotten very little sleep because I was vomiting all the night through. I was lying in my bed and I looked over at my closet doors, which where sliding mirrors, and I saw myself. I looked like I had died. My face was pale, my eyes were black, and I was unusually skinny.
“The look in his eyes, as they stared into mine, has never left me.” p. 109
I did this passage because I can only imagine what it was like to see himself after two years, and how much he had changed since then, he really must have looked like a different person. I am sure that he must have been shocked and I am not surprised that that memory has stayed with him for so long.
Self-sufficiency was encouraged throughout the concentration camps, therefore Elie was forced to grow up and leave his innocence behind. Because of this self-reliance, many started to view their friends and family as a burden rather than a motivation.
About three days later, German troops entered Sighet. They order the people of Sighet to surrender to them or die. The people surrendered and had to give up all their possessions. Moshe was right, it did happen. All the people of Sighet were jammed into train cars and shipped to the concentration camp of Aushcwitz. At that point Eliezer was separated from his family forever with the exception of his father. There was a large crematory in Aushcwitz. You could smell the burning flesh in the air. Eliezer was ordered to the crematory. He came within two paces of it, but then was ordered to the barracks. He was saved for that night only. After that incident, he lived with fear of when was he going to die.
“Two days after my operation, rumors swept through the camp that the battlefront had suddenly drawn nearer. The Red Army was racing toward Buna; it was only a matter of hours.” (80) When Elie heard the news that he could be relieved. He made the choice to leave, later finding out the infirmary was liberated. Returning to the block, his foot
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.
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
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.
She kept screaming that she could see the fire, but nothing was there. It was almost as if she could foretell the gas chambers and crematoriums that awaited them. The others beat her to keep her quiet, thinking she had just lost her mind.... ... middle of paper ...
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 were 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 has lost his faith in God because of all he has been through.
"Put on what weary negligence you please, / You and your fellows. I'd have it come to question. / If he distaste it, let him to my sister" (14 -15).
revenge and revenge and revenge will never come to an end...” (210). Because he had seen first
After a brief stay at Auschwitz, they are moved to a new camp, Buna. At Buna, Elie goes through the dehumanizing process of the concentration camps. Both he and his father experience severe beatings at the hand of the kapos. All the prisoners are overworked and undernourished. Many lose faith in God, including Elie. He witnesses several hangings, one of a boy with an angelic face, and sees him struggle for over thirty minutes fighting for his life. To a stranger's cry of "Where is God now?", Elie answers: "He is hanging here on this gallows...." (p. 62). As Elie witnesses the hanging of the young pipel, he feels that it is his God who is hanging on the gallows. Elie i...
The determining concern of survival confronts both Elie and Chlomo throughout Night. The concept of survival is illustrated by the complications brought upon Elie and Chlomo. Elie and Chlomo believe they could only survive the concentration camps with one another; the father-and-son link was held together for the survival of each other. One complication in particular, was the i...
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.
The ground is frozen, parents sob over their children, stomachs growl, stiff bodies huddle together to stay slightly warm. This was a recurrent scene during World War II. Night is a literary memoir of Elie Wiesel’s tenure in the Nazi concentration camps during the Holocaust. Elie Wiesel created a character reminiscent of himself with Eliezer. Eliezer experienced cruelty, stress, fear, and inhumanity at a very young age, fifteen. Through this, he struggled to maintain his Jewish faith, survive with his father, and endure the hardships placed on his body and mind.
...urvivors crawling towards me, clawing at my soul. The guilt of the world had been literally placed on my shoulders as I closed the book and reflected on the morbid events I had just read. As the sun set that night, I found no joy in its vastness and splendor, for I was still blinded by the sins of those before me. The sound of my tears crashing to the icy floor sang me to sleep. Just kidding. But seriously, here’s the rest. Upon reading of the narrators’ brief excerpt of his experience, I was overcome with empathy for both the victims and persecutors. The everlasting effect of the holocaust is not only among those who lost families÷, friends,