In the non fictional story Night by Elie Wiesel, Elie Wiesel tells his autobiography about when he went through concentration camps. The story takes place during World War Two, when Elie is 15 and 16 years old. He is forced to leave his home in Sighet, Transylvania. Elie goes to three concentration camps called Auschwitz, Buna Buchenwald. Throughout the story, Elie changes spiritually, physically and emotionally. Throughout this time period, Elie changes spiritually. In Sighet, he was a very religious Jewish male. Young Eliezer studied Kaballah under the direction of Moshe the Beadle. Many people thought that Moshe was crazy. An example of how Elie changed from being religious in the concentration camp was that he did not even fast on Yom Kippur. Fasting for a day can easily mean death while in the camps. Many people in the concentration camp, there was a big debate whether people would past or not. He decided to not fast not because he couldn’t, but because he was mad at God. “I did not fast. First of all, to please my father who had forbidden me to fast. I no longer …show more content…
At the beginning of the story, Elie was a physically normal and healthy person. If he would not have been in good shape, he would have been killed but, “The baton pointed to the left.”(Page 32) At that point, nobody knew what the baton pointing either way meant, but the strong, healthy people that were willing to work were pointed to go to the left to work for the Germans. During the story, he hurt his leg. He had to get surgery to fix it. Before he was supposed to leave, the camp became evacuated. Elie had to then do a “death march” with a very hurt foot. Elie, a boy in his teens physically should get stronger, taller, and bigger. During the holocaust, people such as Elie did not get enough to eat, so he physically did not get to his peak. He was physically not alright because of how skinny he was, not allowing him to
In the novel Night, Elie Wiesel gives an account about his life in a concentration camp. His focus is of course on his obstacles and challenges while in the camp, but his behavior is an example of how human beings respond to life in a concentration camp. The mood, personality, behavior, and obviously physical changes that occur are well documented in this novel. He also shows, as time wears on, how these changes become more profound and all the more appalling. As the reader follows Elie Wiesel’s story, from his home in the ghetto, to his internment at Auschwitz-Birkenau, to his transfer and eventual release at Buchenwald, one can see the impact of these changes first hand.
The spiritual change in Elie was substantial. He went from a pious, devout Jew who spent countless of hours studying his faith. He never questioned God, but that is probably because everything was always good. During his stay at the concentration camps, Elie never stops believing in God, although he does question what he is doing. On page 64, Elie says, “Why, but why I should I bless Him? In every fiber I rebelled. Because He had thousands of children burned in His pits? Because He kept six crematories working night and day, on Sundays and feast days? Because in His great might He had created Auschwitz, Birkenau, Buna, and so many factories of death?…” This shows the
Elie experienced many changes, as a person while he was in Auschwitz. Before Elie was sent to Auschwitz, he was just a small naive child that new very little
The holocaust ended May 8, 1945 but it took the lives of millions of people with it. Depriving millions of innocent souls of basic rights we have today. In the book Night, we are shown the experiences and transformations of young Elie from the day he arrived in the ghetto, to his last day in a concentration camp. As a result of his experiences during the Holocaust, Elie Wiesel changes from a religious, sensitive little boy to a spiritually dead, unemotional man.
Elie has lots of character traits that helped him get through Auschwitz, such as resourceful, traitor, and determined. In Night, Elie states “I went back a week later. With the same excuse: I still was not feeling better” (52). Elie came up with excuses to get out of getting his gold crown out. He got resourceful and came up with the idea to keep making an excuse that he was not feeling well, until they got a new doctor and he got to keep his gold crown. He used what he already had to get more out of people later and use his tooth as an advantage. Not only was he resourceful but he was also a traitor. Elie just let his father die and his father was still breathing yet he didn’t move.“My father groaned once more, I heard: ‘Eliezer…’ I could see that he was still breathing- in gaps. I didn’t move” (Wisel 111). He just let his father died and didn’t even try to help him and he died and his last words were “Eliezer…”, but he is thinking for his own future and if he will live or not. He betrayed and was a traitor to his father and didn’t even say goodbye. He was also very determined on living as said by Elie in the expert from his book, “‘Listen to me, kid. Don’t forget you are in a
Quick summary- In the autobiography Night, which took place in many concentration camps in Germany throughout WWII. The author Elie Wiesel, wrote about himself, and the many others that went through the Holocaust. He taught us about his long journey through the terrible time and what he had to go through to come out alive.
At the young age of 15, Elie was forcibly moved into a ghetto and soon after taken to a concentration camp. Human minds do not fully develop until a person reaches about 25 years of age. (Sandra Aamodt, Brain Maturity Extends Well Beyond Teen Years, National Public Radio) Comprehending the Holocaust is impossible for anyone, which makes it that much more unimaginable and unbelievable to a child. It is quite simple for one to lose sight of himself when faced with a scene of pure death. It is fair to say that most people will do anything in return to live a while longer with loved ones. Therefore, morals are thrown out the window and traded
6 million lives, all of those perished in the holocaust for nothing but their religion; So many died but some survived and one survivor in particular Elie Wiesel author of Night tells his story of how at the age 16 he was deported to a concentration camp with his father and saw what took to survive. In those moments where Wiesel is describing what happened is where we decide is hope really the reason he survived or was it is fear?
There are many different ways that Elie changes mentally. At first he believed in god, and studied the Torah and Kabbalah, but as the story goes on that starts to change; “I did not deny God’s existence, but I doubted his absolute existence” (Wiesel 42). Elie started to begin losing his faith when his dad passed away. His death put such a big impact on him that he felt like nothing could be worse than that; “ After my father's death, nothing can touch me anymore” (Wiesel 107).
Though faithful as they enter the horrific camps of Auschwitz, Bergen Belsen, Buna, Birknau, Dachau, and Buchenwald, the Jews become capricious. They start losing grip and begin falling down the slippery slope of death the Germans set up for them as more horrors of the camps become unveiled. Soon after arriving in the camp and being told about the crematoria, he felt “anger rising with me [Elie]. Why should I sanctify His name? The Almighty, the eternal terrible Master of the Universe, chose to be silent” (33). This is the first time that his faith is challenged. After a few days in Auschwitz he “had ceased to pray. I [Elie] was not denying His existence, but doubted His absolute justice” (45). As seen, Elie is beginning to have doubts about God and therefore his belief and faith in him. Finally, when Elie is looking for God to come though he doesn’t and he asks,
His weight changed critically, when he first went in he was a healthy and happy boy, when he came out of the holocaust he was skin and bones. It got to the point of Elie not recognising himself, when he was in the hospital. His weight had all been burned off because of the lack of food and how much he was moving around. He may not have been able to survive another week in that camp after all of that. Elie was not fed much in his concentration camp, every day they got small portions of bread, soup, and coffee. Some days they may have been forced to skip their meals because that is what the kapos
Everybody changes even if it's just puberty or just in the way you act. Change is shown everywhere in the novel “Night” by Elie Wiesel. It’s not just shown physically but it’s also shown mentally. He also had to make many difficult decisions through his journey through the Holocaust. Night is about Pain and Suffering that was caused by the holocaust, and most of that pain was put on the jews.
Before Elie went to the concentration camps, he had many good character traits such as loyalty, Religious, and Impatient. For Example, on page 33, it says “If that is true then I don’t want to wait. I’ll run into the electrified barbed wire. That would be easier than a slow death in the flames” (Wiesel). During this part of the book, Elie and his dad had just arrived at Auschwitz and were being put in a line that was leading to death. Nevertheless, this shows that he is being impatient because he was facing death head on and knew that he might die so he was choosing a quick death rather than burning and slowly dying. Another trait Elie showed before the concentration camp was loyalty. For instance, on page 36, Elie stated “Please sir I’d like to be by my father” (Wiesel). In this part of the book Elie and his family were being separated at the camp and Elie lied about his age so he could stay with his dad. In contrast Elie showed loyalty to his dad by not going with his mom and sister and staying with his dad. This was a very big decision by Elie because he chose the hard way by staying with his dad even if that meant death.
Before Elie went to the Concentration camp, he had many good character traits. On page 31 - 32 Wiesel states, “The wind of revolt died down. We continued to walk until we came to a crossroads. Standing in the middle of it was, though I didn't know it then, Dr. Mengele, the notorious Dr. Mengele. He looked like the typical SS officer: a cruel, though not unintelligent, face, complete with monocle. He was holding a conductor's baton and was surrounded by officers. The baton was moving constantly, sometimes to the right, sometimes to the left”… “This conversation lasted no more than a few seconds. It seemed like an eternity.” In this part of the book Elie had just gotten to the camp and is getting sorted by the angel of death. This part of the text showed that Elie was brave because Elie had just talked to a man who had killed hundreds of people, and he never said he was scared or acted like he was frightened. Another trait he had before he changed was that he was hard working. One example of that trait is on page 50, “Sitting on the ground, we counted bolts, bulbs, and various small electrical parts.” In this part of the book after they got
The novel Night, written by Elie Wiesel about the Holocaust, is an autobiographical account transformed into a novel. Taking place in Sighet,Transylvania, the story transitions into the concentration camps as fifteen year old Elie and his Jewish family are taken to the Ghettos by the Hungarian Police. The “Ghettos,” were an act of bigotry against Jews, were isolated and impoverished parts of a city set up to segregate the Jews from the rest of the population. After they were taken there, they were then transported by German soldiers to Birkenau, a part of the notorious concentration camp, Auschwitz. Prisoners at these concentration camps were fed poorly and given little to live on. They were degraded from human beings to animals, many of the