Night By Elie Wiesel Analysis

While his father is dying in his bed, Elie decides to give him his own ration of bread of soup. However, after doing this a man in the camp says, “I’ll give you a sound piece of advice--don’t give your ration of bread and soup to your old father. There’s nothing you can do for him. And you’re killing yourself.” (pg. 115) . At this point in the book Elie himself realised that by helping and staying with his family made him go through much more hassle than what was necessary. After his dad passed Elie thought, “I might perhaps have found something like--free at last!” (pg. 116). He gathered that his father was keeping him from making the most of plight

The one person in Elie’s life that means everything to him is his father. During his time in the concentration camps, Elie’s bond with his father

In the text, ‘Night’, Elie survives because he keeps alive the hope of survival. An example of this is when he lies about his age and his occupation. “’I’m eighteen’. My voice was trembling” (page 33), this quote is evidence that Elie lied about his age so he does not get thrown into the crematorium, for being too young. Another example of Elie keeping the hope of survival alive is when he outcasts his father and decides to eat his rations. Elie does this because he knows that his father is sick and dying and he cannot help him besides watching him slowly die. Because of this his father has become a burden for Elie, lowing his chances of survival, and when Elie’s father dies Elie feels free from that burden. “And deep inside me, if I could have searched the recesses of my feeble conscience, I might have found something like: Free at last!” (Page 112), this quote evidence

When Elie and his family are sent to a concentration camp, he is fortunate enough to not be separated from his father. At first, this is a relief, and is father is his will to survive. “The idea of dying, of ceasing to be, began to fascinate me. To no longer exist. To no longer feel the excruciating pain of my foot… My father’s presence was the only thing that stopped me. He was running next to me, out of breathe, out of strength, desperate. I had no right to let myself die. What would he do without me? I was his sole support.”(86)

Emphasizing the word ‘me,’ Elie shows himself gradually being consumed by the mindset of ‘every man for himself.’ He worries about his safety more than his father’s pain, and this continues after the officer leaves. His father called out to him again but Elie didn’t move, even when the officer disappeared, he only looked at his father, no aim to help his father and finally returns to his bunk to sleep. When he awoke the following day, his father was gone and Elie states, “deep inside me, if I could have searched the recesses of my feeble conscience, I might have found something like: Free at last! …,” (112). Here, Elie admits that somewhere deep down inside him, he felt released from the responsibility of looking after his father, although pained by his death, relieved of a burden. Deep down he harbored the feeling that his father was just another thing to add to the list of his trouble and

A little over 70 years ago, Elie Wiesel survived a situation that many people could not even fathom. In 1944, Elie and his family were brought to Auschwitz where he nearly experienced death many times.

:After witnessing his friend’s death, Elie started to let the idea of death consume his thoughts to the point that, if his father had not been by his side serving as motivation, he would have died that night during the march. “Death enveloped me, it suffocated me, It stuck to me like glue.”

After marching outside in the freezing weather for days, Elie’s father starts to sleep in the convoy. During his sleep, two “gravediggers” enter the convoy and assume that Elie’s father, Shlomo Wiesel, is dead and they try to throw him out to make room. Elie refuses to believe that his father is dead and desperately tries to wake him up, throwing himself at his body (99). Elie goes into great detail how he tried to wake his father up, saying “I slapped him. I rubbed his hands, crying” and “I started to hit him harder and harder. At last, my father half opened his eyes” (99). Without Elie being there to wake his father up, Shlomo would have been thrown outside in the cold, left to die. Later on, when Elie’s father is deathly ill with dysentery, Elie takes the role of a caregiver and helps his father live a little longer. He would take his father back to his cot and help him lie down (109). Elie also starts to give his father extra rations of bread and water even though deep down, Elie knows it won’t help cure his father from his illness. Every time Elie’s dad pleaded for water, Elie knew “that he must not drink. But he pleaded with me so long that I gave in” (110). Mr. Wiesel relied on Elie more than ever at this time in his life to help him stay alive for one more day even though his future was bleak. Although Shlomo was getting weaker by the day, he needed Elie, his only son, to stay with him and help

Before Elie went to Auschwitz, he possessed many positive character traits, such as being curious, responsible, and disciplined. Weitsel writes, “Together we would read over and over again the same pages of the Zohar. Not to know it by heart but to discover the very essence of divinity” (5). Studying with his tutor and mentor was something Elie loves to do. He grew up in a small town as a strict Orthodox Jew. He loves to learn and read about religion, but he longs to gain a deeper understanding of God and spent many hours with his tutor Moishe, which shows his curiosity for knowledge and discovery. Elie also shows great responsibility in these miserable and anxious times. “Go and wake the neighbors, said my father. “They must get ready…” (Weisel,14). His father asks Ellie to go warn the others in the Ghetto that they must pack their belongings and be ready to leave. Elie’s father trusts him and treats him as an adult. He is often asked to help

As Elie’s life continues he endures more tests that at his age majority of the people would not have experienced. Elie's father was suffering from dysentery and other maladies. On the night of January 28th in 1945, Elie goes to his bunk in exhaustion with his father still alive and in the bunk below him, “I had to go to sleep. I climbed into my bunk, above my father, who was still alive. The date was January 28, 1945”(112). In the morning, Elie wakes up to a new person in the bed where his father had laid. Elie realizes that he has no emotion left to show, especially not sympathy, “I

“Free at last!” (Wiesel 112). “With the death of Eliezer's father, the spiraling down into the narrowing chasm is complete, and Eliezer is left “terribly alone in a world without God and without man.” The journey is at its end” (Estess). It is reveled in the book that after his father died. It is revealed that after his father died, Elie lost all connection with himself (Wiesel 113). “Throughout the book, though, whenever Eliezer questions his father or considers that he is becoming a burden, he eventually chastises himself, much as he does when he realizes that his father has finally died. Eliezer is not a rebellious teenager but, instead, one with a conscience” (Sanderson). He soon regrets this and feels guilty. “He has survived, but it is a survival he can no more come to terms with than the wholly meaningless deaths visited on his family and the millions of others”

In the beginning of the book, before experiencing life threatening difficulties, Elie was much more determined to stay with his family (in order to survive). Eliezer thought that his father was what kept him going and gave him strength, he was certain that the right thing to do was to stay with his dad. In chapter 3 Wiesel states, “My hand tightened its grip on my father. All I could think of was not to lose him. Not to remain alone” (30). In these sentences, Elie explains that he and his father needed to stay together. This quote also shows what Elie’s emotions were; he was scared to suffer through the concentration camp alone. Elie also shows his need for family when he says, “Franek, the foreman, assigned me to a corner... ‘Please, sir ... I’d like to be near

Before Elie makes a decision he thinks how it will affect the future good or bad. At the end of the book, Elie’s father began getting very sick and his health became poor. When Elie’s father begins getting beaten by one of the SS officers, calling out for water, Elie decides to stand down from the officer and allow his father to get beaten, “The officer wielded his club and dealt him a violent blow to the head. I didn't move. I was afraid, my body was afraid of another blow, this time to my head.”

After the departure of Elie’s father he says “since my father’s death, nothing mattered to me anymore”(Wiesel 113). Elie remains focused after his fathers passing and lives to tell his story. 2. Elie struggles to remain humane and hold true to his faith. While in the concentration camp Elie begins to question why God is allowing these horrendous acts to happen to his followers.

The main character is Elie himself as a young boy. Elie is a Hungarian Jew who deeply believes in his religion. When the novel starts he is only