A relationship between a father and a son is a sacred bond, one created at birth and strengthened over time. This paternal relationship is core to the value of family, a likewise bond of faith and trust. Such bonds are tested during times of hardship and pain, seen most clearly during times of war. During the events of World War II, and the gruesome events of the Holocaust, this truth was never more true. Through works such as the memoir Night, by survivor Elie Wiesel, and the artistry of the 1997 film Life is Beautiful, directed by Roberto Benigni, these times of hardships are kept alive in common memory. Through contrasting the lives of Elie Wiesel, and the fictional character of Giosue from Life is Beautiful, in the concentration camp, the evolution of the father-son relationship over time can be seen.
Seventy four years ago, Elie Wiesel was taken from of his town and forced into brutal concentration camps, where he lost his family, was starved, whipped, beaten, and made to witness the executions of many innocent Jews. After three years of unimaginable struggle and hardship, he survived the Holocaust and went on to write Night, a memoir about his horrific experiences, and “Perils of Indifference”, a famous speech. Both of his works have the same powerful message: We cannot ever allow an atrocity such as the Holocaust to occur again. Elie’s message is very important, but which of his works conveys it more effectively?
The Holocaust is considered one of the world’s most explicit examples of inhumanity. The German Nazi regime and their collaborators organized and executed the systematic extermination of millions of Jews, homosexuals, and gypsies. The few that survived set forth on a quest to reconstruct their lives, but were often hindered by the trauma they sustained. Simon Wiesenthal, a Holocaust survivor, struggled with his emotions from the war and sought solace by writing about his experiences as well as founding an organization responsible for catching Nazi war criminals. One of his most famous works, The Sunflower, recounts his interaction with a Nazi soldier lying on his deathbed. This soldier confronts Wiesenthal with the existential question of forgiveness; he asks for a Jew’s forgiveness after killing hundreds of innocent people. At the end of the memoir, Wiesenthal’s moral dilemma becomes open to other interpretations when he poses the question: “What would you have done?” Though many people have grappled with this question, one respondent, Jose Hobday, supports forgiving the Schutzstaffel (SS) officer and expresses her ideas with passion. She supports her claim by stating that forgiveness is essential for maintaining a productive society.
Elie Wiesel went through a lot as a holocaust survivor. Because he had to suffer in concentration camps, I think he should be one to know a lot about the perils of indifference. Elie Wiesel’s book Night, released in 1958 and his magnificent speech, The Perils of Indifference from 1999 both share and try to convince the audience about his main message, which is that indifference is dangerous. In his speech, he explains how indifference about others is much easier than caring about them, and so much easier to look away from victims. His book Night is a haunting tale about the horrors Jewish people experienced during World War II. This book explains the perils of indifference by telling us about how much the Jews suffered and the fact that no one felt the need to act upon these abhorrent actions by the Nazis immediately.
For centuries mankind has faced injustice due to prejudice and hate. How we have dealt with unjust acts has shaped society and molded the way that we think, changing our very morals and values. In Elie Wiesel’s memoir Night, millions of people in concentration camps, including Elie, endure the tyranny of Hitler’s rein in an unforgettable event known as the holocaust. The deplorable conditions and oppressive treatment emphasizes the injustice inflicted upon Elie and his comrades. Wiesel’s theme is to stand up against oppression and speak out against injustice. This is conveyed when Elie chooses to write Night; he depicts the suffering and cruelty holocaust victims endured, which directly raises awareness about the historical phenomenon. Elie’s theme can also been seen through the brave actions and informative words expressed by the characters within his text that refuse to remain silent about the injustice.
Throughout the history of the world, people have displayed hatred towards each other by fighting many wars. Elie Wiesel, a Holocaust survivor, gave a speech at Buchenwald to the President, Chancellor, and people of Germany. Throughout the speech, he establishes that people should learn from past experiences that war, hatred, and racism are meaningless. He accomplishes this belief by using pathos to connect to people’s feelings and emotions. By using pathos, Wiesel develops the central idea of the speech that everyone should change for the better future by accepting wars, hatred, and racism as “not an option.”
It’s difficult to imagine the way humans brutally humiliate other humans based on their faith, looks, or mentality but somehow it happens. On the novel “Night” by Elie Wiesel, he gives the reader a tour of World War Two through his own eyes , from the start of the ghettos all the way through the liberation of the prisoners of the concentration camps. This book has several themes that develop throughout its pages. There are three themes that outstand from all the rest, these themes are brutality, humiliation, and faith. They’re the three that give sense to the reading.
Jewish people were excluded from public life on September 15th, 1935 when the Nuremberg Laws were issued. These laws also stripped German Jews of their citizenship and their right to marry Germans. When the Nuremberg Laws were established, the Jewish population began the process of losing their identity and eventually themselves. As soon as Adolf Hitler came to power in 1933, the human race would be forever scarred. Although it is estimated the number of people killed in the Holocaust was around 11 million, there is a high chance of the death toll being much higher. The sheer amount of lives lost in this horrid time astonishes a large quantity of today’s population. Not only were people being tossed into the concentration camps, but soldiers and civilians were killed in the fight for their lives’. Human beings were given numbers and made to look like clones, as if to hide the misery of dehumanization. Loss of self and personal identity is shown throughout Night by Elie Wiesel.
Of all the terrible events in history, the Holocaust may be the worst of them all. This tragedy was so terrible, I cannot think of the ones who instigated it as human beings. It was against many morals and standards that the world views today as common ethics. The most terrible part of this is, perhaps, how today’s new and younger generations are not sufficiently educated about this disaster. Although many younger generations do not know about the Holocaust, it’s importance should be emphasised in today’s society to learn from it, to realize that every human life is important, and to appreciate the blessings of the present day. I, like many others, did know about the events of the Holocaust for the longest time and when I did, I gained a feeling of disgust towards everything that occurred at that time. In the movie, The Devil’s Arithmetic, I gained a much larger sense of the hostile feeling that this tragedy brought on and it made me realize that this was something that is very important to know and learn about. For the
The Holocaust was a terrible time in the world’s history. Not many Jewish people made it out of the Holocaust alive, but Elie Wiesel not only made it through the dark years, but he also wrote a book and delivered a speech. Both of these things were meant to tell the world about the horrors that happened in the concentration camps and raise awareness about the Holocaust. The book Night tells us what Elie’s journey throughout 1943-1945 (the time of the Holocaust) was like with Nazis controlling the Jews. In the speech Perils of Indifference, Elie explains why it is dangerous to not have an opinion on certain topics. He says that indifference is how the Holocaust got so bad, with other countries not taking a stance and fighting the
Holocaust. Death. Suffering. These are but a few of the words that may begin to describe this tragic period in the history of man. The Perils of Indifference and Night are both publications by the Elie Wiesel, one of the many victims to the Holocaust, but one of the very few victims who lived to tell his story. Once liberated from these concentration camps, Elie has done much to make people around the world more aware of the indescribable events that occurred during his time in these camps, and make sure that people will speak out against these events instead of staying silent, so that these events may be prevented in the future. He wrote many pieces and delivered many speeches in attempt to lift the world out of indifference. I believe that Elie’s novel Night communicates his message more effectively than his speech, Perils of Indifference. Not only does it convey his message of that we all must speak out against
The Holocaust. A short, unimaginable period, of just over twelve years, where almost 6 million Jews were murdered by the German nazis. Overall, 17 million victims were killed and thousands were forced to work in inhumane conditions and live in concentration camps. Elie Wiesel, a victim of the Holocaust, having been deported at the age of 12, is one of the few survivors who lived to tell their story. He has written many books and given many speeches about his experience, but they all convey a similar message, that we as a population, cannot remain silent but to stand up for the indifferences and the horrendous events of this world. He is very well known for his memoir “Night” and his speech “Perils of Indifference.” The message is much more prominent in his book “Night” rather than his speech. Real life examples are provided, it is more understandable, and it leaves you with something to think about. The length, connections, and abundant amount of description helps promote the message as well as the book tells us why we can never let such indifference as the Holocaust happen again.
In “This Way to The Gas, Ladies and Gentleman” by Tadeusz Borowski was a poet and was detained because he was clinically depressed. In this essay I will discuss the importance of “human nature” in the Holocaust and why it contributed to the deaths of millions of Jewish people (among other minority group’s i.e. gay men, black people, disabled people). The question of human nature is irrelevant and inappropriate in discussions about the holocaust. Since it was those questions of human nature that - What makes a human? What is natural? – Started the Holocaust in the first place. The fact that the narrator even has to make this decision should say more about the “human nature” of the Nazis then it does the prisoners. Borowski’s story is told from
Imagine you are nineteen years old and driving with your mother and you crash the car, killing your mother. When a young girl named Sage Singer accidently kills her mother while driving, she starts attending a grief support group intended to help her get though the death of her mother. Sage meets a friendly yet distant old man during the grief support group and they immediately connect. Soon the old man, named Josef Weber, starts of open up about his clandestine past as a Nazi officer at Auschwitz, and his horrible crimes against humanity, as well as his compunction for these crimes. In this journal I will be predicting, evaluating and questioning.
In the late 1920’s, the Nazi party had little success but in 1933, Hitler and the Nazis came to power. Hitler was the leader of a small right-wing party with very extremist ideas. Within a couple of years this party was in control of Germany. The factors that caused Hitler’s success for the rise of Nazism has been studied ever since. Hitler’s organisation skills and personal traits helped to bring the Naizs into power. However, without the socio-economic problems that Germany encountered and the weakness of their political situation, Hitler would not have had the opportunity to come into power and destory democracy in 1933.