Discussion Questions For Night By Elie Wiesel

Reading Elie Wiesel’s Night, has moved me deeply; for the first time in my life to read such horror, pain, and numbness my mind could not digest everything. To think that our own men killed, abused, and tortured their own people is heart wrenching. On page 33, a sentence stuck out to me most that I believe summarizes the whole message of the book. A fifteen year old boy, living day by day, confesses to his father, “I'll run into the electrified barbed wire. That would be easier than a slow death in the flames." Just reading these words, I could imagine this helpless young boy quickly losing faith. He had no desire to live, no motivation to continue, and absolutely no faith in God. A boy that age or anyone should have to think about an easier

In the book Night by Elie Wiesel there are many instances where his use of imagery helps establish tone and purpose. For example Elie Wiesel used fire (sight) to represent just that. The fire helps prove that the tone is serious and mature. In no way did Wiesel try to lighten up the story about the concentration camps or the Nazis. His use of fire also helps show his purpose. “Never shall I forget that night, the first night in camp, that turned my life into one long night seven times scaled. Never shall I forget that smoke. Never shall I forget the small faces of the children whose bodies I saw

I think the purpose for Wiesel writing Night was to tell others about what actually happened during the Holocaust and how he survived. It's important for future generations to be informed about what happened during the Holocaust. If the Holocaust happened again, we could use the information we read in Night and learn from his experience. For example, when Elie said "Hunger was tormenting us; we had not eaten for nearly six days," (page 114) we now know to try not eating all of your bread and soup at once because there might be times when you go days without eating.

1944: German Army vehicles come into Sighet. Rules and regulations for all Jews came into effect.

I chose essay question number 3. I chose this question in particular because there is a couple parts of the book Night that really stand out to me because they seem very emotional and very challenging. And just because I thought it was a very good part of the book. The parts I really liked were the big run the Jews had to run on, the time Elie and his father were in the cart for a couple of days and when Shlomo (Elie’s father) was very ill and Elie had to take care of him.

A part of the book that captured my attention was when Elie’s dad, a strong religious leader, starts to cry. This shocks Elie and he says “It was the first time I saw him cry. I had never thought it was possible”(Wiesel 19). Another pivotal event came when Akiba Drumer, an extremely faithful person, loses all trust in God. This comes, as a direct result, from the horrible experiences he endured while in the concentration camps.

Night is a recollection of Elie Wiesel’s time spent during the holocaust. It is a gripping tale of survival and death. While it is a small book, it has a huge message. During the time in which the book takes place, the Jewish people were srtripped of their humanity. Elie and his fellow inmates at Auschwitz endure dehumanization throughout starvation and on the train to Buchenwald.

Elie and his father are taken to Auschwitz where they are separated from the rest of the family and first hear about atrocities such as the incinerators and gas showers. In the beginning Elie believes that everything is a rumor, a lie, that humankind cannot perform such crimes, but he soon is forced to witness the demise in front of his eyes. This is when his outlook on his faith starts to waver. While watching the smoke billow up from a crematory, Elie hears a man standing next to him begging him to pray, and for the first time in his life Wiesel turns away from God. “The Eternal, Lord of the Universe, the All-Powerful and Terrible, was silent. What had I to thank him for?” (31).

In his Holocaust memoir, Night, Elie Wiesel uses many techniques to help his readers understand the horror of his experiences in Auschwitz, a Nazi concentration camp located in Poland. Wiesel uses many literary devices throughout the memoir, but his use of motifs is particularly strong. Wiesel uses the motif of silence to help his readers understand that the presence of god and all the other countries were gone and that no one was there to speak up in their defense. Throughout the novel Night the Jews are all victimized and there’s no one there to help them during their time of need.

Elie Wiesel’s speech was designed to influence his listeners into action by warning them about the dangers indifference can have on society as it pertains to human atrocities and suffering. The speech helped the audience understand the need for every individual to show their moral conscience in the face of injustice. Wiesel attempts to convince his audience to support his views by using his childhood experience and relating them to the harsh realities while living in Nazi Death Camps as a boy during the Holocaust. He warns,

Firstly, Wiesel is bothered by the fact that everyone in the world can remain silent while the Jews and the others in the concentration camps are being put through such terrible torture. Eliezer asks, “How was it possible that men, women, and children were being burned and that the world kept silent?”(32) There were numerous people that eventually found out what was happening at these concentration camps, but chose to turn a blind eye. Although they were not directly involved in the slaughtering of the Jews, they did remain silent during this time and by ignoring it they are encouraging the

“To forget the dead would be akin to killing them a second time.”, said Elie Wiesel the author of night. Elie Wiesel is a holocaust survivor, he went through 5 different concentration camps. He was dehumanized, malnourished, and abused. He lost all his possessions, his family, and his humanity. In Elie Wiesel’s “Night”, the German Army dehumanizes Elie Wiesel and the jewish prisoners by depriving them of family, food, and self esteem.

Elie would have that feeling in the future, being that the liberation was coming soon, so he will be able to catch up with other people that would be liberated with him. Before liberation would happen, the resistance movement in the camp decided to act and fight the remaining SS in the camp. By the afternoon of that day, all of the SS had left or was dead. In the light of the resistance taking over the camp, “Around six that day, the first American tank was at the front gates of Buchenwalden” (Wiesel 115). Thankfully, no additional lives would be lost in order to liberate the prisoners. Three days after the liberation, Elie became ill with some form of poisoning. From there, Elie was transferred to a hospital going back and forth from life and death like his father in his last days. Elie ends the book in such a symbolic way that will make the reader remember that the Holocaust made such an immense impact that Elie will not forget how he looked in the mirror afterwards, “From the depths of the mirror, a corpse was contemplating me. The look in his eyes as he gazed at me never left me.” (Wiesel 115).

Night by Elie Wiesel is an autobiography about his experience during the Holocaust when he was fifteen years old. Elie is fifteen when the tragedy begins. He is taken with his family through many trials and then is separated from everyone besides his father. They are left with only each other, of which they are able to confide in and look to for support. The story is told through a series of creative writing practices. Mr. Wiesel uses strong diction, and syntax as well as a combination of stylistic devices. This autobiography allows the readers to understand a personal, first-hand account of the terrible events of the holocaust. The ways that diction is used in Night helps with this understanding.

In the memoir Night by Elie Wiesel, Elie Wiesel is a young boy who struggles to survive after being forced to live in the brutal concentration camp of Auschwitz. In Auschwitz, death and suffering is rampant, but due to compassionate words and actions from others, Elie is able to withstand these severe living conditions and overcome the risk of death in the unforgiving Auschwitz. As shown through the actions and words of characters in Night, compassion, the sympathetic pity for the suffering or misfortune of others is critical to the human experience because it enables humans to empathize with each other, empathizing which allows us to feel the need to assist others which can often be vital for survival.