Symbolism in Night Symbolism is the use of symbols to represent ideas or qualities. In the book Night by Eliezer Wiesel, the narrator’s father doesn’t see a problem with wearing the yellow star on his coat because he says that “no one has died from it”, but he doesn’t know or understand that it’s a symbol for something with a hidden meaning. The yellow star made the Jews easy to identify when deporting them to the camps. A different and deeper interpretation is that the yellow star represents isolation and was intended to humiliate the Jews and mark them out for humiliation and discrimination. There are many examples of symbolism in Night. In this paper we will analyze what the use of the title of the book, the spoon and knife Elie’s father gave him, and fire represent. …show more content…
It appears throughout Night as a symbol of the Nazi’s inhuman and sadistic power. Madame Schachter, on the way to Auschwitz-Birkenau, has a vision of fire and it turns out to be a premonition of what’s yet to come. When Eliezer and his father arrive at the camp, they’re forced to watch the Nazis burn babies and young children in a ditch. Most obviously and importantly, fire is a catalyst in the death of millions of Jews in the crematorium, including his father, mother, and youngest sister. In the Bible, fire represents God and divine wrath. But in Night, fire is in the hands of the enemy, and they use it to punish the innocent. This reversal shows how the Holocaust changed Eliezer’s entire concept of the universe and his own
The book Night by Elie Wiesel is an incredibly written memoir about his struggle through the Holocaust. I have chosen to look at the motifs in this memoir. A motif is symbol or image that is constantly referred to in the text. In this paper we will focus on the motif of night and it’s significance to the story telling.
Once they arrived at the camp after a long, distraught, and tiring journey to Birkenau, they had seen the flames coming from the chimney accompanied by a horrid stench of burning bodies. Walking forward, taken as targets, the men and women were separated. Now, all that Eliezer has is his father and he is going to try his very hardest to keep it that way. “All I could think of was not to lose him. Not to remain alone.”
The symbol is Night, the title of the book is also a symbol. Wiesel wanted to use this symbol to respond to what happened at night. Wiesel wanted to tell the reader what he had to do with his new headlines in the evening. Wiesel said the evening experience "made my life a long night, sealed seven times. " The author began to doubt that God could help him get rid of despair and pain, because he appeared in a long suffering and never saw the so-called God.
Night by Elie Wiesel explains that inhumanity leads to hopelessness and mental scars, as represented by the symbol of fire, which depicts Nazi cruelty as well as the cruelty of the Crematory and the death marches. The flame sign represents the Nazis' heinous brutality to Jews. Fire is used to represent Jewish people's death and destruction. The flames appear several times throughout the novel, although Elie first saw them in the cremation.
Eliezer's hellish experience is foreshadowed by Madame Shachter's insane screaming on the train to Auschwitz. The pit of burning babies scars Wiesel for life. The specter of the furnace haunts Wiesel and his fellow prisoners throughout. The symbol of fire in Night, however, is ironic. No longer is fire a tool of the righteous to punish the wicked.
Holocaust has been a horrendous genocide during the second world war which must not happen again. Since Hitler desired to demolish all the Jewish people, he commenced to eliminate them by setting up the concentration camps and it consequently led to over 6 million Jewish casualties. Although there was a mass murder during the holocaust, some Jewish people have successfully survived and one of them is Elie Wiesel who has written a novel, “Night.” In the story, it reveals the cruelty of Nazis who incinerate Jewish children in a furnace for fuel. As Elie and other Jewish people approach to the camp in a packed train, they sight smoke from an incinerator and starts to smell burning flesh.
(Yes, we did see the flames.) Over there-that's where you're going to be taken. That's your grave, over there.'" (Wiesel 28). This gruesome sight contributes to the termination of Elie’s faith because it intimidates him from wanting to go to Heaven.
Night Essay Symbolism is a very creative and different thing. When we did musicals in Elementary school we had characters that symbolized different people and or characters. In the novel Night, there were many uses of symbolism. In this essay we will go over the use of fire, the description of Juliek’s violin and Elie’s use of the corpse as symbolism.
When describing something as a star with a raging fire that will burn out when horrible things happen, the author uses symbolism to give it a deeper meaning or a more vivid visual image. In their eyes, the gradually fading stars meant death. The sparks represented the loss of his religious culture. Throughout the long nights spent in concentration camps, on trains, and in the ghetto, Wiesel witnesses the Nazis' atrocities. Mr. Weisel's perception of time has shifted as the days and nights seem to stretch on indefinitely. "
The well-spoken Quintus Horatius Flaccus, more commonly known as Horace, once professed that hardship has the ability to provoke hidden skills that otherwise would have never displayed themselves. This philosophy is especially true in comparison to the life of Elie Wiesel, a courageous Holocaust survivor. Wiesel writes to all who haven't lived through the horror that is known as the Holocaust, in efforts of “transmitting the history of the disappearance” of those who were brutally and unrightfully killed. With a tone of gloom and mourning, Wiesel argues that if it wasn't for the fire that was ignited under him to relay the stories of those who were lost at Auschwitz, he would have never become the descriptive writer that he is. Many find that
“A dark flame had entered into my soul and devoured it.” (pg 34 Wiesel). The quote from Night explains how Eliezer and the others felt. They feel fear, agony, hopeless, all they could do was sit omit and watch death consume
In the memoir Night by Elie Wiesel, Elie tells the story of how he survives the Holocaust. The experience Elie has is one of a kind, and not something just anyone can live through. He is berated, starved, abused, and harassed during his time in Birkenau and Buchenwald, all while his loyalty to God is constantly tested. If Elie did not have such a strong connection and belief in God, he would not have turned out the same, or even survived. Fire occurs and is mentioned in the story many times.
In the novel Night, which is about a survivor of the Holocaust, there are many symbols just like the star. In this essay, the use of fire, corpses, and a Jew named Juliek and his violin as symbols, will be examined. Fire is constantly used throughout the novel, Night. Madame Schachter, a Jew, was the woman who brought up the use of fire. Madame Schachter was a woman who went crazy
It is evident that throughout the novel, night symbolizes a sense of darkness and despair. Through self-deception, Eliezer counteracts the nighttime with the thought that daylight will come each day. To Eliezer, the morning symbolizes a new start and another day of hope of outlasting the horrors of the Holocaust: “The night had passed completely. The morning star shone in the sky. I too had become a different person” (37).
Eliezer believed that god did not care about inhumanity they were going through. After his near death experience, Eliezer started to lose his optimism. “I could not believe human beings were being burned in our times; the world would never tolerate such crimes… ”(33). The fact of seeing people being killed right in front them really opened their eyes. The first experiences of the concentration camp crushed the spirits of the