5. At the end of Night, Wiesel writes, "From the depths of the mirror, a corpse was contemplating me. The look in his eyes as he gazed at me has never left me" (pg. 115). What parts of Eliezer died during his captivity? What was born in their place?
At the end of Night by Elie Wiesel, the author gazes into a mirror for the first time since before he had been sent to the concentration camps. As Elie puts it, “From the depths of a mirror, a corpse was contemplating me” (pg. 109). He, of course, is talking about himself, or the shell of himself he had become after spending years in the concentration camps. During his time at the concentration camps, he had shed parts of his life and developed new aspects of his personality in order to adapt to his new lifestyle in German captivity. Wiesel himself puts it best: “Never shall I forget those flames which consumed my faith forever. Never shall I forget that nocturnal silence which deprived me, for all eternity, of the desire to live. Never shall I forget those moments which murdered my God and my soul and turned my dreams to dust. Never shall I forget these things, even if I am condemned to live as long as God Himself. Never” (pg. 32). This was clearly the moment when Elie changed. The naive child Elie once was died and was replaced by a faithless, cynical adult.
One part of Elie that died - very early on in the story - was his devotion to Judaism. Towards the beginning of the book Elie is a jewish boy who is very fervent about