Family Is The Key To Survival In Night By Elie Wiesel

There are times when people are hurting and feel like giving up, but then they think of their family and they keep trying. In the novel “Night” by Elie Wiesel, Elie the narrator and protagonist is at a concentration camp. Although he lost his mother and sisters the first day, he still has his father with him. As the story goes on, readers learn of the hard experiences he goes through and what is going on his mind the whole time. He struggles with his faith and belief in God and he learns what it means to live not just for himself, but also for the one’s who love him. By examining the novel Night, we can see that family is the key to survival, which is important because those who do not have family often end up not surviving because they don’t have someone to push them and someone to live for besides themselves.

One example is the time Elie wants to close his eyes after running for a really long time, but his father doesn’t let him close his eyes, knowing if he did he would die. When they are running, the idea of death begins to fascinate Elie, but then he looks over and see’s his father struggling at his side and that makes Elie want to keep going. The time when Elie’s father dies, Elie says he feels relieved and said if he searched his conscience he would find something like, “free at last!”. A reason he thinks like this could be because he might feel that he could let go or that he doesn’t have to keep living for his father. In the text it says, “The idea of dying, of no longer being, began to fascinate me. My father’s presence was the only thing that stopped me… He was running at my side, out of breath, at the end of his strength, at his wit’s end.” (92-93) This shows that if his father is not at his side, he would’ve gave up and die while running. That being said, if Elie’s father isn’t there to keep pushing him, then he would