Seemingly Selfish In Elie Wiesel's 'Night'

He was finally free, no joy filled his heart but abandonment was drowning it. How dangerous is indifference to humankind as it pertains to suffering and the need for conscience understanding when people are faced with unjust behaviors? Elie Wiesel is an award winning author and novelist who has endured and survived hardships. One of the darkest times in history, a massacre of over six million Jews, the Holocaust and Hitler himself. After the Holocaust he went on and wrote the internationally acclaimed memoir “Night,” in which he spoke out against persecution and injustice across the world. In the compassionate yet pleading speech, ¨Perils of Indifference,¨ Elie Wiesel analyzes the injustices that himself and others endured during the twentieth century, as well as the hellish acts of the Holocaust through effective rhetorical choices.

In a way being selfish is what got humans where they are today.The evolution of humans required competition,and aggressive selfishness. We were forced to be selfish and watch our own back, to always put ourselves first in bad situations. This reaction to put ourselves first is natural, it’s in our blood. However, is the very thing that made us so successful as a species the one thing that so easily tears us apart? As humans we have an incredible capacity to dehumanize others to protect our own self interest.

Some of the things that happened during the Holocaust was murder, starvation, gas chambers, mistreatment, concentration camps. What was Elie Wiesel purpose for writting the book Night? One reason for Elie Wiesel’s writting the book Night was to remind people of what happened to him/ the Jews. He also wrote it to remind people of it so people do not forget. Also, to make sure something like the Holocaust does not happen again.

When a son kills his father over bread, the meaning of Night is further brought to light. It is illuminated by the fact that Elie loves his father very much, how little food they were given, and how ruthless people had become to get what they needed.

One day, when Elie returned from the warehouse, he was summoned by the block secretary to go to the dentist. Elie therefore went to the infirmary block to learn that the reason for his summon was gold teeth extraction. Elie, however pretends to be sick and asks, ”Couldn’t you wait a few days sir? I don’t feel well, I have a fever…” Elie kept telling the dentist that he was sick for several weeks to postpone having the crown removed. Soon after, it had appeared that the dentist had been dealing in the prisoners’ gold teeth for his own benefit. He had been thrown into prison and was about to be hanged. Eliezer does not pity for him and was pleased with what was happening

The holocaust is the most deadly genocide in the world that impacted millions of life by controlling and running life because of one mean man. In Elie Wiesel memoir, The Night is describing his own experience before, during and after the holocaust. He describes in meticulous details his experience in the concentration camps such as Auschwitz and Buna with is father. Wiesel depicts how the Nazi slowly destructs every interpersonal relationship in the Jews community. Within the autobiography, Wiesel shows how the interpersonal relationships are important within the population in general, in the concentration camp and in more precisely with is own relationship with his family.

Many themes exist in Night, Elie Wiesel’s nightmarish story of his Holocaust experience. From normal life in a small town to physical abuse in concentration camps, Night chronicles the journey of Wiesel’s teenage years. Neither Wiesel nor any of the Jews in Sighet could have imagined the horrors that would befall them as their lived changed under the Nazi regime. The Jews all lived peaceful, civilized lives before German occupation. Eliezer Wiesel was concerned with mysticism and his father was “more involved with the welfare of others than with that of his own kin” (4). This would change in the coming weeks, as Jews are segregated, sent to camps, and both physically and emotionally abused. These changes and abuse would dehumanize

Indifference means not caring. According to Google, indifference means, lack of interest, concern, or sympathy. Unimportance. The novel Night by, Elie Wiesel, shows many ideas of indifference. The quote on the front cover, “A slim volume of terrifying power”- The New York Times, touches me because it is just one man's story out of millions that have a story to tell of the terrifying horror that happened to them during that time. Of course, indifference was part of the whole book because it was about the Jews and the Nazi Army did not care about them.

As humans, we require basic necessities, such as food, water, and shelter to survive. But we also need a reason to live. The reason could be the thought of a person, achieving some goal, or a connection with a higher being. Humans need something that drives them to stay alive. This becomes more evident when people are placed in horrific situations. In Elie Wiesel's memoir Night, he reminisces about his experiences in a Nazi concentration camp during the Holocaust. There the men witness horrific scenes of violence and death. As time goes on they begin to lose hope in the very things that keep them alive: their faith in God, each other, and above all, themselves.

The Holocaust was not only a way for the Nazis to purge the Jews, it was also a movement for a new way of thinking, that as long as the person in front of you holds a military-grade firearm there is nothing you can do to change your fate. In the memoir Night, Elie Wiesel recounts his journey through life in nazi concentration camps. Elie struggles with his faith and morality as he and his father witness the horrors of the Holocaust. Night reveals that it’s in human nature to hope for survival through religion and faith, however it can also fail in the most trying of circumstances when you have to relent to authoritarianism.

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.

In the memoir, Night, author Elie Wiesel portrays the dehumanization of individuals and its lasting result in a loss of faith in God. Throughout the Holocaust, Jews were doggedly treated with disrespect and inhumanity. As more cruelty was bestowed upon them, the lower their flame of hope and faith became as they began turning on each other and focused on self preservation over family and friends. The flame within them never completely died, but rather stayed kindling throughout the journey until finally it stood flickering and idle at the eventual halt of this seemingly never-ending nightmare. Elie depicts the perpetuation of violence that crops up with the Jews by teaching of the loss in belief of a higher power from devout to doubt they

“Where there is no human connection, there is no compassion” (Susan Vreeland). Perhaps no time in history was more devoid of human connection, and therefore compassion, than the Holocaust. Individuals had to fight starvation, gas chambers, forced labor, and often each other. This struggle for survival led to the loss of compassion in the camps. In Elie Wiesel’s Night, the author uses the struggles of Madame Schachter, the executed prisoner, and Elie’s father to prove that when people have to fight to survive, they often fail to show compassion to others.

In due time, the stimulation and activation process would occur. I feel a charge and attachment to certain stories. There is an energy – a part of me that lights up, that is activated and turns on. Story is an invitation – a key. The activated parts of me are the human stories, the dormant parts, and the emotions that were not integrated and made whole.

The end of a story is just as important as the beginning. The end of a story seeks to bring a sort of closure to the adventure that was just had in the pages before. With the more intense the story the more difficult the end is. Elie Wiesel’s book Night has an ending that seems rather abrupt but is none-the-less appropriate to the horror that was written on the pages before. The title itself is significant to the end of the story, not just because it is where the story begins, but because the end of the end of the story is the end of the long night that was the Holocaust.