Night Elie Wiesel Repetition Essay

The repetition of the parallel events in the memoire also helps trace Wiesel’s changes throughout the course of his imprisonment at the concentration camps. For example, when Rabbi Eliahou is looking for his son after the 42-mile march, Wiesel realizes that during the run, the Rabbi’s son had intentionally run near the front of the pick after seeing his father stagger behind. Understanding that the son had been trying rid himself of his father whom he thought to be a “burden,” Wiesel prays to God to give him the resolve to never think about abandoning his own father (87). However, later on, when his father is struck with dysentery and is taken away on January 29 at the verge of death, Wiesel thinks to himself, “And, in the depths of my being,

Additionally, on the train ride to Buchenwald from Gleiwitz, when the German townspeople are throwing morsels of bread onto the train, stampedes erupt, and the savage Jews, who are driven by hunger, murder each other for the small crumbs (95). Several years later, in Aden, a fiendish Parisian woman on a boat throws coins to the native children who are brawling to the death to grab the coins. Elie Wiesel implores her to stop the madness, to which she responds, “Why not? I like to give charity…” (95). Based on Wiesel’s reaction to the second experience, it is evident that he does not want to remember the barbaric events that had occurred in the train. In addition, since he had previously been on the receiving end of the exchange, unlike the sadistic woman who derives pleasure from seeing the children fight, Wiesel is capable of relating to the native kids, who driven by necessity, are struggling for the seemingly insignificant