Brief Summary Of Night By Elie Wiesel Foundation For Humanity

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Night is a very heart-wrenching memoir written by Elie Wiesel. Elie was born 1928 in Sighet, Transylvania which is now part of modern-day Romania (The Elie Wiesel Foundation for Humanity). At the age of fifteen he was transported with his family to Auschwitz. His mother and younger daughter perished while in the labor camp, but his two older sisters survived. (The Elie Wiesel Foundation for Humanity). After the war in 1945, Elie became a journalist and was persuaded to write about his experiences within the labor camps. In 1978, President Jimmy Carter appointed Elie Wiesel as Chairman of the President’s Commission on the Holocaust. He has received more than 100 honorary degrees from institutions across the world (The Elie Wiesel Foundation …show more content…

Night opens up with the story about Eliezer and his family of Orthodox Jews who make sure to strictly follow all Jewish traditions and laws. Throughout the book, Elie develops his thesis, that inhumanity toward other humans can lead to a loss of morality, through the story telling of the horrible events that happened to him throughout his life, specifically during his time spent in the work camps. Eliezer is studying the Talmund, or Jewish Oral Law, and the Cabbala (Wiesel 3-4). Going again his father’s wishes he finds a teacher named Moshe the Beadle. Around the time he finds Moshe, the Hungarians expel all foreign Jews from Sighet. After a few months pass, Moshe returns and begins to explain all the horrible things they are making Jews do, including digging their own graves. No one will believe him, which highlights humanity’s way to ignore warnings given even when they catch glimpses of the evil themselves (Wiesel 7). We see other examples of this on the train into Auschwitz where Madame Schächter is attempting to warn everyone of the chimneys and fire, but they ignore, beat, and gag her until she stops talking (Wiesel 25).

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