Elie Wiesel, "Night"

"I did not weep, and it pained me that I could not weep. But I was out of tears."


"Night" is the autobiographical account of a child experiencing the horrors of the holocaust. Eliezer is a child in Romania who witnesses the Jewish people of his town, including his family, unsuspectingly being readied, and eventually rounded up and taken to Auschwitz and later Buchenwald, concentration camps set up by the Nazis for the miserable labor and mass extermination of the Jews. Through the eyes of a child, one sees the horrors, evil and inhumanity that is possible from the minds of men. Humanity is extinguished as Eliezer's story unfolds and torture, rampant murder, and death from starvation and exhaustion are portrayed. Throughout the story, foundations of faith in God are shaken, the identity of people as human beings are stripped bare, interactions with others, even with family members, become matters of survival, and life and death are in the hands of desensitized men capable of monstrous acts. Even after the allies free the inmates from their bondage, looking at himself in a mirror for the first time since being rounded up in his own town, unknowing of what was to follow, the indelible effect on Eliezer stands clear. The capability of humans to commit acts of atrocious violence must never be taken for granted.

Links:
Elie Wiesel Foundation for Humanity

Citation Information:
Wiesel, E. (2006). Night. New York: Hill and Wang.