This year in English, I had to read Night by Elie Wiesel during the time in class we were learning about Holocaust. The memoir was about a young teenager life in Auschwitz-Birkenau Camp during the Holocaust. While reading this book, I learned many things like how some people did not give up, how Nazis dehumanized prisoners and how Eliezer and many people were changing throughout the Holocaust. While reading Night, I also learned how some people did not give up including Eliezer. Half way through the memoir, you would notice that Eliezer is giving up slowly by slowly but he gets himself up for his father. Many prisoners who believed that god would do the right thing and help them through there but that did not happen. For example, Akib Drummer …show more content…
Dehumanization made people feel like they are worthless. When they came to the camp, they were dehumanized by giving less food and crammed them into barracks which had little space to sleep, they also stripped them and cut their hair. Nazi generals took their belongings and valuables from Jews. Jews and other targeted groups were tattooed numbers to get registered. On Eliezer’s first day of the camp, “Never shall I forget the small faces of the children whose bodies I saw transformed into smoke under a silent sky”(Wiesel 34). On Eliezer's first day he passes by a pit where babies were thrown. Nazi threw children, men and women’s bodies into piles of bodies and then burnt them. Victims were also forced to march if one falls to the ground, then they would kill them immediately. When Jews were sent place to place, they were crammed into a cattle car which included “eighty...in the car” (Wiesel 24) and then “100 or so in the wagon” (Wiesel 103). This explains how people got really thin and more people were able to fit in at the end of the memoir. Dehumanization took a big role in the …show more content…
In the Beginning, Eliezer believed in God and it’s power but after being dehumanized and tortured he has lost faith in God. He says that,”I no longer accepted God’s silence” (Wiesel 69), Eliezer does not like how God’s not helping them get through the horrible time. One evening when Eliezer went to eat after witnessing a death, he finds “the soup excellent one evening” (Wiesel 60). But when he witness a young pipel from Buna’s death he finds, “the soup tasted of corpses” (Wiesel 65). Wiesel felt horrible because the young pipel did not know what’s happening and he was hung for something he did not do. In the text, Eliezer wanted to kill himself (Wiesel 33). But soon enough, Eliezer’s thought of his father keeps him alive. He thought about what his father would if Eliezer died, his father would not have anyone or a reason to be alive and he will suddenly die as well. At the end of the book when Eliezer’s father died, Eliezer felt “free at last!” (Wiesel 112). Eliezer did not have to worry about his father anymore and he was glad and upset but did not his emotions. Eliezer changed a lot from the beginning to the end of the
However during Eliezer’s first departures end, In the text Eliezer prays to God in his head and thinks "Oh God, Master of the Universe, in your infinite compassion, have mercy on us ... " (PG 20) but sadly in this story his calls will go unheard and shall be acquitted with years of torture and no help from his lord. Nevertheless later during the line that Eliezer and his father were taken he questions to himself why should he praise the name of the almighty master of the universe as they had not done anything to be thankful for. Moreover after the initial transportation and encounter with the angel of death Eliezer shall never forget the day his god was killed and his dreams turned to ashes.
Nazis dehumanize their victims in many horrific and unimaginable ways. In Elie Wiesel’s book Night the Nazis dehumanize the prisoners physically, mentally, and emotionally. The prisoners are physically dehumanized by going to forced death marches, receiving awful food, and getting beaten. The food the prisoners receive barely satisfies their hunger and it is not enough to give them the strength they require to work and survive.
He still believed in his god despite of all the circumstances. Eliezer still believed that somehow God will still stay and help him despite how small his faith was diminished to. At the end of the story, Eliezer has lost
1. Before we even open a book, our minds begin to engage and to make assumptions. As you look at the cover of the book Night, what images and emotions does the title evoke? What impression does the design on the cover make on you? What prior knowledge do you have about Night or its author Elie Wiesel?
Eliezer Wiesel loses his confidence in god, family and humankind through the encounters he has from the Nazi death camp. Eliezer loses confidence in god. He battles physically and rationally forever and no more accepts there is a divine being. "Never should I overlook those minutes which killed my god and my spirit and turned my fantasies to dust..."(pg 32). Elie endeavored to spare himself and asks god commonly to bail him and take him out of his hopelessness.
(Wiesel 112). Eliezer is sad when his father dies, but is more relieved because he can take care of himself now. Another way Eliezer is dehumanized mentally is through his religion. Before he was sent to the concentration camps, Eliezer believed God always knew best. But as the memoir goes on, Eliezer loses his faith.
Dehumanization Causing Events in Night Over the course of Eliezer’s holocaust experience in the novel Night, the Jews are gradually reduced to little more that “things” which were a nuisance to Nazis. This process was called dehumanization. Three examples of events that occurred which contributed to the dehumanization of Eliezer, his father, and his fellow Jews are: people were divided both mentally and physically, those who could not work or who showed weakness were killed, and public executions were held.
Eliezer has to learn how to adapt to not having as food as he used to, being beaten for no reason, and watching daily hangings. Eliezer specifically remembers one particular hanging of a young boy, a pipel, whose master has been gathered arms for the resistance. Eliezer said “But the third rope was still moving: the child, too light, was still breathing… ” Eliezer remembers how the child cried and remained alive for the next half an hour, before his body finally gives out and the child dies. Towards the end of the book, as the group that Eliezer and his father are in keeps running around Germany, and Eliezer has a choice to give up and die on the side of a road, but he continues to run because of his father. Eliezer says “My father’s presence was the only thing that stopped me.
To illustrate, a change of identity occurs, “If only [Eliezer] were relieved of this responsibility… Instantly, [he] felt ashamed, ashamed of [himself] forever,” when he almost tried to leave his father alone (106). Elie faces a permanent change of identity when he strays away from his old educated habits and becomes a selfish creature when going through pain. Another example of a change of identity within Elie is when his father dies, “And deep inside [him], if [he] could have searched the recesses of [his] feeble conscience, [he] might have found something like: Free at Last!” expressing that his father’s death finally freed him, out of the misery, out of the agony (112). Eliezer’s journey with his father through the excruciating concentration camps developed him from an innocent teenager to a mature man with the capabilities to succeed in unbearable situations.
Eliezer was very close to god and wanted to learn anything he could. Once he was taken away from his home, he began losing faith in god and lost all hope. Eliezer stopped praying and he believed that god was unjust. Eliezer felt as though god was uncaring and so he stopped believing in him. His view on god changed juristically throughout Night.
In which millions of Jews were innocently killed and persecuted because of their religion. As a student who is familiar with the years of the holocaust that will forever live in infamy, Wiesel’s memoir has undoubtedly changed my perspective. Throughout the text, I have been emotionally touched by the topics of dehumanization, the young life of Elie Wiesel, and gained a better understanding of the Holocaust. With how dehumanization was portrayed through words, pondering my mind the most.
(33). He starts to wonder what kind of God would allow such devastation to occur, and he vows, “Never shall I forget those moments that murdered my God” (34). The concentration camps tarnish Eliezer’s belief in a compassionate God. As he spends more time in the camps, Eliezer admits that he has “ceased to pray” (45). Praying used to be a central part of his life, but the camps have made him dubious of God’s power.
One day Eliezer comes to his father’s bed and he is gone most likely taken to the crematory. He doesn't mourn for him and feels bad because of it, but he also feels
Eliezer and his father rely on one another to survive through the Holocaust. Together they encounter the cruelty of the Nazis, the lack of compassion from the prisoners, as well as the difficulty of simply surviving. They remain strong together unlike other father-son relationships seen in the novel. A majority of the prisoners gravitate towards self preservation while Eliezer chooses to remain with his father. Eliezer does exhibit ambivalence in continuing to help his father because the conditions of the Holocaust continually make it harder to make others a priority than oneself.
One of the themes in Elie Wiesel’s Night was to preserve one’s physical well being while also keeping their humanity during the struggles they faced in the Holocaust. The Nazis went to great lengths to ensure the Jews felt less of a human. The Jewish were all placed into one category during the holocaust. It did not matter their social rank, what they owned, etc. They were a “problem” that was soon going to be handled, in ways that were ungovernable.