During a time of war and crisis, there are only two types of people: people that live or people that die. Both Night, by Elie Wiesel, and A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier, by Ishmael Beah, are set in a time of war and crisis. The theme “hope and fear drive human behavior” best fits these two novels. During tough times, such as war, many people get into a mode of self-survival; fear can be a great motivator and has the ability to take away one’s humanity and to turn a once loving human being to a selfish monster. During the book Night, Elie faces many life changing challenges and is endeavoring to survive in the Holocaust. Eliezer catches himself being inhumane at times throughout the novel. The prisoners themselves were treated barbaric …show more content…
He undergoes many difficult situations that he either has to live with, or die. He changed from a young, innocent boy to a careless soldier, to a rehabilitated adult due to his war ravaged country. During the war, Ishmael was separated from his family. He had hope throughout the story that one day he would be reunited with his family, this sliver of hope pushed him to keep walking and not give up. Ishmael later witnessed the attack of the village his family was supposedly in and finally found out his family was dead (Beah, 117). Later, the soldiers told Ishmael and many other people they had a choice to be in the army or to go out on their own. Ishmael feared if he did not become a soldier he would end up getting killed by the rebels. This fear reflected his decision on becoming a solider. “The idea of death didn’t cross my mind at all and killing had become as easy as drinking water. My mind had not only snapped during the first killing, it had also stopped making remorseful records, or so it seemed.” (Beah, 122). This fear caused Ishmael to have nothing on his mind except to kill the enemy, it brainwashed him. Although, these experiences turned him into a malicious human. Fear and hope drove Ishmael’s decisions throughout the
Night is a book by Elie Wiesel about his experience with his father in the Nazi German concentration camps at Auschwitz and Buchenwald. They were given no food , the only thing they had was a piece of bread . They lived on snow . No one had strength left and they couldn’t handle it . Elie’s mother and three sisters get separated from Elie and his father.
Faster, you filthy dogs! In the book “Night”, Elie faces some very excruciating events that take place in several concentration camps. These camps include Auschwitz, Buna, Gleiwitz, and Buchenwald. And while some of them are just cruel, most events are dehumanizing.
Night by Elie Wiesel is an autobiography about Elie during the time of the Jewish Holocaust. In the beginning of the book, Elie lives a normal life with his parents and three sisters until something horrid supposedly happens to a poor fellow in town. He is taken out of Sighet by the Hungarian police, shot, and left for dead. He escapes and tells everyone of what horrible events he witnessed, but people are skeptical on believing him. All of the sudden they are taken by gestapo to many concentration camps.
He was so close to finally seeing them again that when he lost that opportunity, it was like losing them all over again. This impacted him emotionally. Losing his family again made him angry and sad at the same time. He is filled with frustration and anger, and he later took his frustration out on Gasemu with violence. Ishmael lost many things during the war, the most impactful on his path was his family being lost.
The books Night by Elie Wiesel and The True Story of Hansel and Gretel by Louise Murphy are both books about the holocaust. Though they are based off of the same event, they are quite different in many ways, just like they are the same in others. The book Night is about a boy and his father who are Jewish and are forced to go to a concentration camp. This book is mostly about what it was like in the concentration camps and how the characters suffered. The True Story of Hansel and Gretel, on the other hand, is about two Jewish kids who are separated from their parents and find a old lady to help them.
As I have been reading Night, Real Time, and Long Way Gone I have seen things that relate to our lives today like the situation with all of the characters in each of these books trying to survive in there circumstance that they are in. I feel like I live each day trying to thank god for waking me up and going on with my days just like what the characters of “Night” and “Long Way Gone” with the different characters situation they had to face in order to survive and improve themselves. From the particular situation with friends and family with the discussion of understanding the story a little bit better than what I have found about the story was with my teacher Mrs.Smith and her understandings of what I should do in order to understand the books we have read.
Due to distress within the German community, Adolf Hitler rose to power just before World War II. He became more and more powerful and his influence dispersed nationally. Hitler’s popularity lead him to begin the extermination of anyone Jewish; known today as the Holocaust. Over the years many stories have been told about the Holocaust. Tales of survival and triumph, tribulation and sorrow.
“Never shall I forget that night, the first night in camp, that turned my life into one long night seven times sealed” (Wiesel 34). In both Night and Life is Beautiful, the Jews encounter their first night at the concentration camps and although their experiences during the Holocaust may be different, they still share this same gut wrenching feeling of what the beginning of pure Hell is like. Night is an autobiography written by Elie Wiesel and translated by Marion Wiesel. It was published in 1955 after vast copies and constant rejection. Wiesel felt a responsibility to share not only his story, but the story of many others who are not as lucky as him and have the opportunity to tell everyone what they went through.
In the book Night by Elie Wiesel, from chapter three, Elie is a young sensitive boy with dreams, later on, all Jews had to go to work in the concentration camp. For example, Elie was full of hopes but the camp brought him a terrible experience, “Never shall I forget that night, the first night in camp, which has turned my life into one long night…” (page 34) This shows that the author is who at first naive, he studied Kabbalah with Moishe, had nothing to worry about until the order came Germans threw to an abyss, had no rights. Furthermore, when he first came to the camp he knew nothing, until he witnessed his mother and sister walked farther, an old man fell on the ground and intermediately shot, from that moment he started to disbelief and
In the book “Night” by Elie Wiesel shows an inside glimpse of how jews were treated in the holocaust. It shows what his daily life was in the concentration camp Auschwitz and how he had to fight for his life every day and how harsh the weather and the cruelty was. The book also shows how the human rights were broken. One of the human rights that were broken was article 13 which states “Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state.” and in the book it says “Jews were prohibited from leaving their residences for three days, under penalty of death” (Wiesel 10).
They are also faced with the challenge of overcoming the physical and emotional scars of war, and dealing with the loss of family and friends. Despite these struggles, the characters ultimately find the strength and support to rebuild their lives and find a sense of belonging in society again. The loss of innocence is one of "A Long Way Gone" main themes. Ishmael, like many other child soldiers, was forced at a young age to abandon his childhood and become a killer. He explains how he had to learn to suppress his emotions, kill without hesitation, and accept violence as a natural part of life.
During a time of great struggle, there is no doubt that the event will cause the person to change. In something so horrible and traumatizing as the Holocaust, where the Nazi soldiers inflicted so much fear on the Jews, there is no doubt they would feel forced to change in order to survive. Since the Nazis committed such heinous crimes, the victims of the holocaust began to deny their faith, go against their morals in order to survive the stress, and their physical appearances changed due to the little food the Nazi’s gave them in the Concentration camp. Eliezer, the main character of the novel Night, goes through an intense character change from the beginning to the end of his story as a holocaust victim. This event in his life causes a change
Night Final Open Ended Question Night, written by Elie Wiesel, is a memoir about his life as he goes through the Holocaust. Eliezer goes through many situations that cause him, and other Jews, to be dehumanized by the Nazis. The three levels of dehumanization are physical, mental, and emotional. Eliezer was affected by all three. Never in his whole life did he imagine that this would happen to him or his family.
“I realized that he did not want to see what they were going to do to me. He did not want to see the burning of his only son”(42). When Eliezer arrives at Auschwitz, the separation of his family puts an emotional toll on his father since he realizes that only him and Eliezer are still alive. This will be a catalyst to their relationship becoming stronger as they endure more together. Elie Wiesel, the author of the novel Night writes his own personal accounts of experiencing the Holocaust through the character Eliezer.
“Have faith in life, a thousand times fath. By driving out despair, you will move away from death” (Wiesel 41). These words are a piece of advice a Pole gives Elie, the main character in the memoir, Night, and his block upon entering Auschwitz for the first time. Characters in both the movie and the memoir utilize the advice the young Pole gives Ellie in order to live for as long as possible. The two works cover the Holocaust from a first person perspective and serve as mediums through which the public can remember the dreadful event.