The overall purpose of Wiesel’s speech was to emphasize the danger of indifference and the importance of compassion. He has made this compelling to the reader through his use of devices such as pathos, and by calling us, the readers and listeners, to take action, warning us that passivity is itself a choice. Wiesel’s prime exigence is his experience in the Holocaust, where ‘a Jewish boy discovered the Kingdom of Night’ (118). This boy is a symbol; a version of himself separated and personified as another victim, lost to the horrors of the Holocaust. He is Wiesel’s naivety, his innocence, and his youth, and now Wiesel’s duty to remember. For the young Jewish Boy, Moishe the Beadle was the only one able to warn him. However, as the world did …show more content…
Wiesel must take it upon himself to ensure such human suffering is not repeated, that his warning will be heard and the world will take action. As he speaks about the horrors of the Holocaust, he makes sure to establish that “the world did know and remained silent”-- it was not ignorance that cost millions of lives, but apathy; silence. He continues, telling the listener “we must take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented.” (118). He maintains the motif of silence tied to death and terror, adding to the theme of the integrity of dissidence, a call to action. His audience is the world: future and present generations. He is not making a broad statement that ‘people’ must take action, but us; the listener and even himself, both contained in the subject ‘we’. He conveys this through his address to the audience and the context of the year, writing that in 1986 “more people are oppressed than free,” begging the question “how can one not be sensitive to their plight?” (119). He uses the example of the imprisonment of Nelson Mandela who fought against the system of apartheid in South Africa, reminding us that human suffering is ever present, and must be stopped through action and compassion, not averting one’s
Wiesel pinpoints the indifference of humans as the real enemy, causing further suffering and lost to those already in peril. Wiesel commenced the speech with an interesting attention getter: a story about a young Jewish from a small town that was at the end of war liberated from Nazi rule by American soldiers. This young boy was in fact himself. The first-hand experience of cruelty gave him credibility in discussing the dangers of indifference; he was a victim himself.
Kaiden Sheridan Mrs.Browne English December, 20, 2022 Rhetorical Analysis Paragraph In Night, Eliezer Wiesel’s autobiographical memoir, the rhetorical devices simile and hyperbole describe Elie’s father, conveying the message of hope being coherent with mental health and instilling ideas of despair, the relatable emotion that resides with me the greatest. For example, Elie returning to the medical area after the bread distribution and finding his father “weeping like a child” leads me to believe that the mental torment of concentration camps takes a toll on the well being of Elie’s father, representing the reprocussions of dehumanization(79). I think that Elie’s father cries because people treat him worse than he usually expects. This
Literary Analysis The Holocaust was a time in history, which affected many people and events and still does today. It is the hope that we will learn from what occured by reading the literature generated by survivors and family members. In the book Night by Elie wiesel, the reader learns several life lessons from the horror and triumph of those who lived through this time, which are shown in stories, essays, and personal accounts. The lesson which is most predominant in the book is Apostasy.
During World War ll, a very well known man, Adolf Hitler, chose to kill himself when he was put in crisis, leaving his country in ruins, as well as revealing that he was very much selfish, cowardly, and scared. As shown in the novel Night written by Elie Wiesel, during the Jewish Holocaust, when put in testing situations, many people act poorly towards the Jews, and the Jews show hatred towards the Germans. Also, in the short story ¨The in Group¨ by Eve Shale, a young girl by the name of Eve chooses between popularity and rightfulness. In both Night and ¨The in Group¨ it is demonstrated that crisis brings out the worst in people, because challenging situations put more pressure on people, resulting in poorer choices, and crisis additionally causes people to show selfishness.
(75). By explaining that he feels as if the memories of the Holocaust are becoming “forgotten” and “hollow” in content, Wiesel implies how distracted and unaware the modern generation of citizens are in regards to the discrimination and genocide that took place not so long ago. By using distinct imagery Wiesel validates his fears of others forgetting about those who died a gruesome death during this time of terror by providing a way of visualizing and ultimately relating to his valid concerns. After reading Wiesel’s phrase, one is
Elie Wiesel is one of the many people in this world that have lived and endured through many tragic events throughout their life due to genocide. However, it has inspired him to become a human rights activist. He, like many others, have been affected by the harmful ways of genocide in which it has inspired him to make a difference in the world. He has seen and been through mass killings, starvation, and many more that traumatized him (Machajewski 6). The cruel world that Wiesel had seen and been through during the Holocaust has inspired him to educate people’s minds about genocide and its harm on society through his works of literature and activism.
Elie Wiesel, a Holocaust survivor, uses his culture as a way to educate the world on what it was like to be a young boy forced from his home, family, and friends, to be tortured for years, to watch his community burned into ashes, just for the rest of the world to remain indifferent to the horrors that the Jewish people were facing at the hands of the Nazis. In his autobiography “Night”, Wiesel tells the story of his life-changing experience as a child at Auschwitz. He describes how he will never forget how he felt as well as the things he experienced. Wiesel states, “The student of Talmud, the child I was, had been consumed by the flames. All that was left was a shape that resembled me.
Nobel Peace Prize Award winning, Elie Wiesel’s main purpose both as a speaker and writer, was to inform the world about the truth behind the tragic mass genocide of European Jews during the Holocaust. However, Wiesel’s secondary purpose was to educate the world on indifference and to persuade them into acknowledging the ugliness that occurs when one becomes indifferent. As a survivor of the Holocaust, Elie Wiesel bore the burden of keeping the tragic memories of what had happened and still went on to create something beautiful out of it. He ensured that he would be taking a step in making sure something like the Holocaust would not happen again by educating the world on the event and informing them that indifference truly kills.
Elie Wiesel voiced his emotions and thoughts of the horrors done to Jewish people during World War II whilst developing his claim. Wiesel “remember[s] his bewilderment,” “his astonishment,” and “his anguish” when he saw they were dropped into the ghetto to become slaves and to be slaughtered. He repeats the words “I remember” because he and the world, especially those who suffered in the ghettos and camps, would never be able to forget how innocent suffered. Consequently, he emphasized that “no one” has the right to advocate for the dead. Like many other people in the world, he lost his family during the war.
Holocaust survivor and American Jewish author, Elie Wiesel in his serious and pensive speech, “The Perils of Indifference,” asserts that “to be indifferent” of the world’s problems “is what makes the human being inhuman” and is the reason that genocides along with millions of deaths have occured (The Perils of). He supports his claim by revealing to his audience his personal experience in the concentration camps of the Holocaust to appeal to their emotions so that they can understand what he had to go through; moreover, Wiesel uses strong, emotionally loaded language to further create a stronger impact when describing our world and society as being involved with “so much violence” and “so much indifference.” Additionally, he uses imagery to illustrate indifference as “not only a sin,” but “a punishment.” Wiesel’s purpose is to make “the human being become less indifferent and more human” in order to bring about change in
To find a man who has not experienced suffering is impossible; to have man without hardship is equally unfeasible. Such trials are a part of life and assert that one is alive by shaping one’s character. In the autobiographical memoir Night by Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel, this molding is depicted through Elie’s transformation concerning his identity, faith, and perspective. As a young boy, Elie and his fellow neighbors of Sighet, Romania were sent to Auschwitz, a macabre concentration camp with the sole motive of torturing and killing Jews like himself. There, Elie experiences unimaginable suffering, and upon liberation a year later, leaves as a transformed person.
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.
During the Holocaust, the Germans deprived minority groups, especially the Jews, of human qualities, personalities, and spirits. The German Nazis treated the Jews like animals and forced them to endure abominable physical tortures. In the novel, Night, Elie Wiesel narrates his life during World War II as a Jew; he is compelled to be relocated to a concentration camp with his father, but unfortunately, he and his father are separated from his mother and sisters. Wiesel and his father face many situations where they are dehumanized along with the other fellow Jews. Through his perspective, the readers discover the cruel and disgusting practices taken against the Jews.
Night Critical Abdoul Bikienga Johann Schiller once said “It is not flesh and blood, but the heart which makes us fathers and sons”. But what happens when the night darkens our hearts our hearts? The Holocaust memoir Night does a phenomenal job of portraying possibly the most horrifying outcomes in such a situation. Through subtle and effective language, Wiesel is able to put into words the fearsome experiences he and his father went through in Auschwitz during the Holocaust. In his holocaust memoir, Night, Elie Wiesel utilizes imagery to show the effect that self-preservation can have on father son relationships.
Finally, the author expresses the dangers in ignorance and forgetfulness, “Because if we forget who the guilty are, we are accomplices” (Wiesel). He also conveys how if we forget the guilty, we do not care about what crimes they put forth. We cannot be ignorant to the oppressors, for the effect is the same as to side with them. In conclusion, Elie Wiesel persuades the audience and expresses his bias on neutrality during World War II by using his authority and personal