Throughout the novel Night, Elie Wiesel takes us on a journey from a quiet Jewish community, Sighet, to the horrors of the concentration camps he was sent to, lastly being Buchenwald. He shows us his life from being with family and friends, to the atrocities that took place in the camps by skillfully using figurative language, imagery, symbolism and denotative and connotative meanings to give the reader an eye-opening glimpse into his life. Elie Wiesel’s use of diction and syntax are simple and unsophisticated. This should not be thought of in a negative way. He gets his story across in a concise manner that is easy to understand, yet he is able to evoke the horror of that time in his life giving the reader a clear image and vision throughout the story. His writing is not wordy and drawn out, but rather in short sentences. The strength of his language leaves the reader with a keen sense of the pain the Jews felt as the Nazi’s managed to dehumanize them. His diction and syntax leads to numerous examples of figurative language throughout the book. Many similes are shown to show the manner that the Jews were treated during the Holocaust. “They passed me by, like beaten dogs, with never a glance in my direction. They must have envied me.” (Weisel 35) This quote refers to members of Elie’s town when he was 15, and the Hungarian police had rounded up people to leave the ghetto. Elie compares the members of his town to beaten dogs using the term “like.” They most likely wished they could have traded places with Elie. Elie also shows how camps were prisons by saying, “The barbed wire that encircled us like a wall did not fill us with real fear.” (Wiesel 29) Wiesel compares the barbed wire to a wall using the term “like.” Wiesel refers to the emptiness of the Ghettos when being transported as, “ Open rooms everywhere. Gaping doors and windows looked into the void. It all belonged to everyone since it no longer belonged to anyone. It was there for the taking. An open tomb. A summer sun.” (Wiesel 35) He states this because he is comparing the town to an open tomb and a summer sun because everybody who lived in the town had been taken by Nazis. An open tomb is something everyone can look at, while a
Within Wiesel’s reflection of his life during World War II, it is evident that Night reveals much that is wrong with human nature, particularly the cruelty represented by the Nazis. During the novel, Elie and every other Jew suffer extreme circumstances, such as, having to leave their loved ones behind or being threatened to do
Concentration camps are similar to the things people see their nightmares. The creation of a twisted government that spread hatred and suffering throughout the world. Night is an in depth account of the atrocities committed in these horrible places. The story of dehumanization of an entire group of people through the eyes of a young boy,Elie Wiesel. In Night Wiesel portrays the dehumanization of the jewish people as unnatural and undeserved. The difficulties Wiesel went through are all collected in one small book
Over 5 million people died between 1933 and 1945. Additionally, around half of these deaths happened in a concentration camp. This point in time is commonly referred to as the Holocaust. In Elie Wiesel’s book "Night” that documents Elie Wiesel’s struggles in a ghetto and then being transported throughout Germany to these awful places that are made for death. However, in the novel “Night,” Elie Wiesel uses dialog, ellipses, and symbolism to show the bond he has with his father. (73)
The Holocaust is an unforgettable event to anyone who had to live through the horrors of a concentration camp. Elie Wiesel is no exception. He was taken to a concentration camp in 1944 and lost his mother and father in the concentration camps. Mr. Wiesel was brave enough to step forward and share his experiences during the Holocaust, which he recorded in his book Night. In his book Night, Elie Wiesel uses irony, foreshadowing, and tone to describe the uncertainty of one’s future before going and while in a concentration camp.
Elie Wiesel, the author and the character in the memoir Night, fights to live through the Holocaust with his father. Wiesel, a 13 year old boy from Transylvania, his father, his mother and three sisters struggle to live through the Holocaust. Together the father and son battle against starvation, dehydration, hypothermia, and the multiple of brutal beatings given by the Nazis, while the mother and three sisters are separated from them. Finally after a hard year and a half Wiesel’s father dies of dysentery in Buchenwald, another concentration camp outside of Auschwitz, just shortly before Wiesel and his father could be liberated from the camp by the Russians. Hitler, a man corrupted by power, lead the Axis against the Allies. While doing so
Throughout the novel, Wiesel's figurative language displays how hope got him through some of the atrocities of the Holocaust. An example where their hope is brought up in the novel is when the anti-Jewish laws are put in place in Wiesel's hometown, he states that, "To the very last moment, a germ of hope stayed alive in our hearts" (Wiesel 25). Wiesel uses the metaphor "germ of hope" to figuratively describe how the amount of hope was not abundant, but it never completely vanished. He states that this hope lasted till the last moment, which also implies that this is what got the Jews through the Holocaust. An instance where Wiesel's language displays what hope got him through is when he describes the hangings that he witnessed, upon which he reflects that the soup tasted like corpses that evening (Wiesel 72).
The appeal to emotion is the strongest by far. It seems almost impossible for a reader not to cry at the words of Wiesel. Elie paints a portrait of life in the camp, which included hours of back-breaking labor, fear of hangings, and an overall theme throughout the book: starvation. His vivid description of a child being hanged, how he was still alive, “struggling between life and death, dying in slow agony under our eyes”, truly captures the ghastly occurrences of the death camp. His own discussion of how he had lost faith in a God, and how other sons were leaving or even beating their fathers with no care enlightens the reader to the true despair that surrounded the people that inhabited these camps. Also, his description of himself in a mirror as “a corpse” that “gazed back at me” installs in the reader the overwhelming sense of how this event so completely ravaged the human soul.
Night contains a significant amount of figurative language. Select 3 examples from the text to analyze. In analyzing each example, be sure to explain how the specific example impacts the text. (How does it affect the reader? How does it affect the reading experience? Why did Wiesel make that specific choice?) Please use a different type of figurative language for each example.
The Holocaust claimed millions of lives , and the survivors witnessed an event incomprehensible to the remainder of humanity. Elie Wiesel, a burdened survivor of the Genocide, describes his own experiences in his autobiographical memoir Night. Throughout the years in the concentration camps, Wiesel and the other Jews witness countless events of Nazis intentionally dehumanizing the Jews. After hearing these brutal remarks for years, Wiesel begins to internalize these thoughts. His internalization is reflected in his writing as he often compares himself and the others to animals. He compares the Jew’s physical traits, but also the way in which they act. Elie Wiesel animalizes the Jews while personifying darkness to further dehumanize the Jews and show how the Nazi’s mental warfare continues to affect him.
Elie Wiesel’s book “Night” shows the life of a father and son going through the concentration camp of World War II. Their life long journey begins from when they are taken from their home in Sighet, they experience harsh and inhuman conditions in the camps. These conditions cause Elie and his father’s relationship to change. During their time there, Elie and his father experience a reversal in roles.
Night is an autobiography of Eliezer Wiesel’s life. Night takes readers through the horror, determination, and loss of hope during Elie’s journey through the Holocaust. This journey is wrapped up into a small volume; but it gives off enough powerful messages to be a one thousand page novel. Violence plays an important part in this story and is given much attention to through the trials Elie faces. Eliezer experiences violence against himself, his father, and many other people he is surrounded by.
The novel Night by Eliezer Wiesel tells the tale of a young Elie Wiesel and his experience in the concentration camps,and his fight to stay alive . The tragic story shows the jewish people during the Holocaust and their alienation from the world. Elie’s experience changes him mentally, and all actions in taken while in the concentration were based on one thing...Survival.
Figurative language plays an important role in Elie Wiesel’s holocaust memoir, “Night”. He uses powerful words to show, rather than tell, the reader what he was experiencing. He speaks to the readers from his point of view, which helps make the image so clear that it is as if the reader was witnessing it in person. He also uses this language to express his feeling and, the mood and atmosphere of the concentration camps. With these literary devices the author was able to help us clearly understand the intensity of his situation and the distress that he and the remaining jews, were ` abandoned in.
Imagine experiencing one of the largest genocides in history first-hand. Elie Wiesel explains in detail his experiences of Nazi Germany in his popular book Night. Wiesel walks through the horrifying truths of being kicked out of his home, getting thrown in and out of different concentration camps and witnessing innocent people burned to death, sent to the gas chambers and shot point blank, because of their religion or sexuality. Wiesel uses symbolism multiple times throughout Night to aid in reader's understanding of how tragic the events of the holocaust were.
The novel “Night” was written by Elie Wiesel and is a memoir of his life during World War II. The book starts with his life living in Hungary with his family. It then tells of how they were taken away to concentration camps throughout the war. During Elie’s stays at the various camps you see the sacrifices he makes and how the experience changes him.