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Survival The novel Night is about survival because 15 year old Elie Wiesel is put face to face with S.S. Guards in Nazi concentration camps. He has to adjust his life from being a normal 15 year old boy who went to school, ate dinner on a regular basis and was treated as a human to being caged with his friends and family and everyone was being starved, beaten, burnt alive and hanged on a daily basis. Elie learned that his only way to survive the concentration camp was to adapt to that lifestyle...to accept the fact that people were dying and not to let that ruin his own chance of survival.
Faith Wiesel, as well as many prisoners, lost their faith in God. There are many examples in the beginning of Night where people are trying to keep and strengthen their faith but there are many more examples of people rebelling against God and forgetting their religion. The first example of Elie loosing his faith is when he arrived at Auschwitz. Elie and his father are directed to go to the left. A prisoner then informs them that they are on their way to the crematory. Elie's father recites the Kaddish or prayer for the dead. Revolt rises up inside of Elie and he questions God. Why should I bless His name? The Eternal, lord of the Universe, the All-Powerful and Terrible, was silent. What had I to thank Him for? (Wiesel 31) Another example of prisoners in the concentration camp loosing their faith in Night is when the pipel, a young child, was hung in front of the whole camp. The pipel was the Oberkapo’s servant. The Oberkapo was the leader of the fifty-second unit. He never struck or insulted the prisoners who worked under him ,that is why the prisoners loved him . Even though most pipels were cruel and hated, this one had the face of a sad angel and was loved by all. The Oberkapo was suspected in the intentional explosion of Buna’s electric power station.
Relationships As the book begins Wiesel depicts his father as being a man who cared more about his work than his family. Wiesel obviously felt that his father devoted too much time to the happiness of others and not enough to him or his family. When Elie desires to study his religion with greater exploration, his father dismisses him as being too young. It is evidence that the two were not as close as they could have been in the time before the Holocaust. Over the course of this time in the concentration camps, Elie goes through rollercoaster's of emotion regarding his father. At times Chlomo is his life line; the only reason Elie does not give up and die. At other times Elie feels that his father is a burden. He can't march well or keep up with the others. Elie feels at times that his father is pulling him down, not out of lack of affection, but that the concentration camp is such a place it required him to concern himself with his own survival only. At times his father physically saves Elie from death; in turn Elie saves his father several times from the fate of death. The last word that Elie hears from his father's mouth is his name "Eliezer".
Courage A good example would be when Wiesel and his father were leaving Gleiwitz. However before they could pass the gates, Wiesel hears terrible news:"A group of SS officers were standing there. A rumour ran through our ranks- a selection! The SS officers did the selecting. The weak, to the left; those who could walk well, to the right.My father was sent to the left. I ran after him.... I slipped in among the others. Several SS rushed to bring me back, creating such confusion that many of the people from the left were able to come back to the right- and among them, my father and myself" (91).As you can see, Wiesel risked his life to save his father from being killed, although shots were fired.
Dehumanisation This book demonstrates how powerful a few people and one idea can be. Hitler set out to destroy a race of people and was almost successful in doing so. He convinced an army to hate the same way that he hated and so the Jews during WWII were treated like animals. They were stripped of their belongings, clothes, and dignity. They were tortured, murdered, and desecrated. Elie's account of his experience gave us a vivid window into the experiences of the Jews in the camps and the soldiers showed nothing resembling compassion or consideration for any of the people in these camps.
