Advertisement
Uncovering the Stark Realities: Facts About Night by Elie Wiesel
Introduction:
Elie Wiesel's Night stands as a chilling testament to the horrors of the Holocaust, a visceral narrative that transcends the boundaries of historical account to become a profound exploration of faith, resilience, and the depths of human depravity. For those seeking a deeper understanding of this seminal work, this comprehensive guide delves into key facts about Night, exploring its historical context, literary significance, and enduring impact. We'll unravel the narrative's structure, examine its powerful themes, and uncover the lasting legacy of Wiesel's unforgettable story. Prepare to confront the stark realities reflected in Night and gain a nuanced appreciation of its importance.
I. Historical Context: The Seeds of Night
Night is not merely a fictional tale; it's a meticulously crafted memoir based on Elie Wiesel's personal experiences during the Holocaust. Understanding the historical context is crucial to fully grasping the weight and authenticity of his narrative. The book details his deportation from Sighet, Transylvania (then part of Hungary) to Auschwitz-Birkenau in 1944, along with his father, Shlomo. It vividly portrays the systematic dehumanization, brutality, and unimaginable suffering inflicted upon Jewish people within the Nazi concentration camps. The narrative provides a chillingly accurate depiction of the selection process upon arrival, the grueling labor, starvation, disease, and the constant threat of death. This historical backdrop lends undeniable weight to Wiesel's account, making it a powerful and unforgettable record of a dark chapter in human history. Understanding the specific historical events – the rise of Nazism, the implementation of discriminatory laws, the systematic extermination – enhances one's understanding of the emotional and psychological trauma depicted in Night.
II. Narrative Structure and Key Characters:
Night unfolds chronologically, following Eliezer's (Wiesel's alter ego) journey from relative normalcy to the unimaginable horrors of Auschwitz and Buchenwald. The narrative structure is intensely personal, focusing on Eliezer's evolving relationship with his father, Shlomo. Their bond becomes a central theme, highlighting the strength and fragility of familial ties amidst unimaginable suffering. Other significant characters, although often fleetingly depicted, serve to emphasize the pervasiveness of cruelty and the struggle for survival. The impersonal nature of the Nazi regime, represented by figures like the Kapos (prisoner functionaries) and the SS officers, is juxtaposed against the intensely personal experiences of Eliezer and his father, creating a poignant contrast between systemic evil and individual resilience. The narrative's simplicity, however, does not diminish its emotional power; the stark prose mirrors the stark reality of the camps.
III. Exploring Key Themes: Faith, Loss, and Resilience:
Night grapples with profound themes that resonate deeply with readers. The most prominent is the loss of faith. Eliezer's initial devout faith is progressively eroded by the brutality he witnesses, leading to profound questioning and ultimately, a crisis of belief. This exploration of faith's fragility under extreme duress is central to the book's impact. Alongside this is the theme of the dehumanization inflicted upon the Jewish people. The systematic stripping away of their dignity, their identities reduced to mere numbers, highlights the devastating consequences of prejudice and hatred. However, amidst this despair, the theme of resilience shines through. Eliezer's unwavering commitment to surviving for his father, and the strength displayed by many within the camps, becomes a testament to the enduring human spirit. The book is not simply a tale of suffering, but also a story of survival and the enduring power of the human will.
IV. Literary Significance and Lasting Impact:
Night has achieved canonical status, becoming a cornerstone text in Holocaust studies and a powerful tool for fostering empathy and understanding. Its unflinching portrayal of the Holocaust has had a profound impact on education and public awareness. Wiesel's simple yet evocative prose ensures that the horrors he describes are unforgettable, leaving a lasting impression on readers. The book's enduring legacy lies not only in its historical accuracy but also its ability to transcend the specifics of the Holocaust to speak to universal themes of human nature, morality, and the importance of remembrance. It serves as a stark reminder of the dangers of hatred, indifference, and the importance of fighting against injustice.
V. A Detailed Outline of Night
Introduction: Life in Sighet before the deportations, the growing sense of unease and anti-Semitism.
Main Chapters:
Deportation to Auschwitz-Birkenau: The horrific journey, the selection process, and the initial experiences in the camp.
Life in Auschwitz: The brutal realities of camp life – work, starvation, disease, violence, and the constant threat of death. The breakdown of social structures and the struggle for survival. The death of Eliezer's mother and younger sister.
Transfer to Buchenwald: The further hardships faced during the transfer and life in Buchenwald.
Liberation and Aftermath: The liberation of Buchenwald and the profound emotional and psychological impact on Eliezer. The initial struggle to comprehend the experience and the gradual process of healing and rebuilding.
Conclusion: Reflections on the experience, the enduring questions about faith, and the imperative to remember.
VI. Explaining the Outline Points:
Each section of the outline represents a pivotal stage in Eliezer's journey. The introduction sets the stage, contrasting the relative peace of his pre-war life with the ominous signs of impending danger. The subsequent chapters meticulously detail the progressive dehumanization and brutalization he and his fellow prisoners endure. The experiences described are horrific and meticulously detailed, revealing the systematic cruelty of the Nazi regime. The transfer to Buchenwald represents another harrowing chapter, further emphasizing the relentless nature of the persecution. The conclusion, however, isn't simply a resolution but rather a reflection on the lingering trauma and the imperative to remember the victims and prevent future atrocities.
VII. FAQs about Night by Elie Wiesel:
1. Is Night a factual account? Yes, it is a memoir based on Elie Wiesel's firsthand experiences during the Holocaust.
2. What is the main theme of Night? The loss of faith, the dehumanization of the victims, the struggle for survival, and the enduring power of the human spirit are all central themes.
3. Who are the main characters in Night? The main characters are Eliezer (Wiesel's alter ego) and his father, Shlomo.
4. What is the setting of Night? The story primarily takes place in the concentration camps of Auschwitz-Birkenau and Buchenwald.
5. What is the tone of Night? The tone is somber, stark, and emotionally raw, reflecting the horrific realities of the Holocaust.
6. Why is Night important? It serves as a powerful testimony to the Holocaust, helping readers understand the horrors of the event and the importance of remembrance.
7. Is Night suitable for all readers? Due to its graphic depiction of violence and suffering, it may not be suitable for younger or more sensitive readers.
8. What is the significance of the title Night? The title symbolizes the darkness and despair of the Holocaust experience.
9. How has Night impacted the world? It has had a profound impact on Holocaust education, public awareness, and our understanding of human resilience.
VIII. Related Articles:
1. Elie Wiesel's Life and Legacy: A biographical overview of Wiesel's life, his activism, and his enduring impact on the world.
2. The Holocaust: A Historical Overview: A comprehensive exploration of the causes, events, and consequences of the Holocaust.
3. The Power of Testimony in Holocaust Literature: An analysis of the importance of personal accounts in understanding the Holocaust.
4. Comparing Night to Other Holocaust Narratives: A comparative analysis of Night with other notable Holocaust memoirs and novels.
5. Themes of Faith and Doubt in Night: A deeper dive into the exploration of faith and its fragility in the face of unimaginable suffering.
6. The Dehumanization Process in Nazi Concentration Camps: An examination of the methods used by the Nazis to dehumanize their victims.
7. The Role of Fathers and Sons in Night: An analysis of the complex relationship between Eliezer and his father.
8. The Enduring Relevance of Night in the 21st Century: A discussion of the book's continued relevance in contemporary society.
9. Teaching Night in the Classroom: Strategies and resources for effectively teaching Night in educational settings.
facts about night by elie wiesel: Teaching "Night" Facing History and Ourselves, 2017-11-20 Teaching Night interweaves a literary analysis of Elie Wiesel's powerful and poignant memoir with an exploration of the relevant historical context that surrounded his experience during the Holocaust. |
facts about night by elie wiesel: Dawn Elie Wiesel, 2006-03-21 Elie Wiesel's Dawn is an eloquent meditation on the compromises, justifications, and sacrifices that human beings make when they murder other human beings. The author . . . has built knowledge into artistic fiction. —The New York Times Book Review Elisha is a young Jewish man, a Holocaust survivor, and an Israeli freedom fighter in British-controlled Palestine; John Dawson is the captured English officer he will murder at dawn in retribution for the British execution of a fellow freedom fighter. The night-long wait for morning and death provides Dawn, Elie Wiesel's ever more timely novel, with its harrowingly taut, hour-by-hour narrative. Caught between the manifold horrors of the past and the troubling dilemmas of the present, Elisha wrestles with guilt, ghosts, and ultimately God as he waits for the appointed hour and his act of assassination. The basis for the 2014 film of the same name, now available on streaming and home video. |
facts about night by elie wiesel: Elie Wiesel's Night Harold Bloom, Sterling Professor of Humanities Harold Bloom, 2014-05-14 Discusses the characters, plot and writing of Night by Elie Wiesel. Includes critical essays on the novel and a brief biography of the author. |
facts about night by elie wiesel: The Time--night Li︠u︡dmila Petrushevskai︠a︡, 2000 First published in Russia in 1992, The Time: Night is a darkly humorous depiction of the Soviet utopia's underbelly by one of the most brilliant stylists in contemporary Russian literature. Anna Andrianova is a trite poet and disastrous parent. Heading a household dominated by women, she can cling to the myth of the all-powerful yet suffering Russian matriarch. Challenging that myth is her headstrong daughter Alyona, a woman with appalling judgment and several illegitimate children, who both needs Anna and hates her. |
facts about night by elie wiesel: The Facts Philip Roth, 2013-07-02 The Facts is a rigorously unfictionalized narrative that portrays Philip Roth unadorned--as young artist, as student, as son, as lover, as husband, as American, as Jew--and candidly examines how close the novels have been to, and how far from, autobiography. From his childhood in Newark, New Jersey, to his explosive success as a novelist, to his critics in the Jewish community who attacked his writing, and the divorce and death of his first wife, The Facts is a playful and harrowingly unconventional autobiography, bookended by letters written by his fictional alter-ego Nathan Zuckerman. The Facts is a lively and serious version of a novelist's life. —New York Review of Books |
facts about night by elie wiesel: What the Night Sings Vesper Stamper, 2018-02-20 A Morris Award Finalist Longlisted for the National Book Award For fans of The Book Thief and The Boy in the Striped Pajamas comes a lushly illustrated novel about a teen Holocaust survivor who must come to terms with who she is and how to rebuild her life. A tour de force. This powerful story of love, loss, and survival is not to be missed. --KRISTIN HANNAH, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Nightingale After losing her family and everything she knew in the Nazi concentration camps, Gerta is finally liberated, only to find herself completely alone. Without her papa, her music, or even her true identity, she must move past the task of surviving and on to living her life. In the displaced persons camp where she is staying, Gerta meets Lev, a fellow teen survivor who she just might be falling for, despite her feelings for someone else. With a newfound Jewish identity she never knew she had, and a return to the life of music she thought she lost forever, Gerta must choose how to build a new future. What the Night Sings is a book from the heart, of the heart, and to the heart. Vesper Stamper's Gerta will stay with you long after you turn the last page. Her story is one of hope and redemption and life--a blessing to the world. --Deborah Heiligman, award-winning author of Charles and Emma and Vincent and Theo A WALL STREET JOURNAL BEST CHILDREN'S BOOK OF 2018 A KIRKUS REVIEWS BEST BOOK OF 2018 |
facts about night by elie wiesel: A Thousand Darknesses Ruth Franklin, 2010-11-19 What is the difference between writing a novel about the Holocaust and fabricating a memoir? Do narratives about the Holocaust have a special obligation to be 'truthful'--that is, faithful to the facts of history? Or is it okay to lie in such works? In her provocative study A Thousand Darknesses, Ruth Franklin investigates these questions as they arise in the most significant works of Holocaust fiction, from Tadeusz Borowski's Auschwitz stories to Jonathan Safran Foer's postmodernist family history. Franklin argues that the memory-obsessed culture of the last few decades has led us to mistakenly focus on testimony as the only valid form of Holocaust writing. As even the most canonical texts have come under scrutiny for their fidelity to the facts, we have lost sight of the essential role that imagination plays in the creation of any literary work, including the memoir. Taking a fresh look at memoirs by Elie Wiesel and Primo Levi, and examining novels by writers such as Piotr Rawicz, Jerzy Kosinski, W.G. Sebald, and Wolfgang Koeppen, Franklin makes a persuasive case for literature as an equally vital vehicle for understanding the Holocaust (and for memoir as an equally ambiguous form). The result is a study of immense depth and range that offers a lucid view of an often cloudy field. |
facts about night by elie wiesel: Vows Peter Manseau, 2006-10-17 In this multi-generational tale of a family's unshakeable faith, the author tells his parents' courageous story--as a priest and a former nun who wed--and deftly weaves how their decision has affected his own spiritual journey. of photos. |
facts about night by elie wiesel: The Accident , 1746 |
facts about night by elie wiesel: All Rivers Run to the Sea Elie Wiesel, 1996-10-22 In this first volume of his two-volume autobiography, Wiesel takes us from his childhood memories of a traditional and loving Jewish family in the Romanian village of Sighet through the horrors of Auschwitz and Buchenwald and the years of spiritual struggle, to his emergence as a witness for the Holocaust's martyrs and survivors and for the State of Israel, and as a spokesman for humanity. With 16 pages of black-and-white photographs. From the abyss of the death camps Wiesel has come as a messenger to mankind—not with a message of hate and revenge, but with one of brotherhood and atonement. —From the citation for the 1986 Nobel Peace Prize |
facts about night by elie wiesel: A Night Divided (Scholastic Gold) Jennifer A. Nielsen, 2015-08-25 From NYT bestselling author Jennifer A. Nielsen comes a stunning thriller about a girl who must escape to freedom after the Berlin Wall divides her family between east and west. A Night Divided joins the Scholastic Gold line, which features award-winning and beloved novels. Includes exclusive bonus content!With the rise of the Berlin Wall, Gerta finds her family suddenly divided. She, her mother, and her brother Fritz live on the eastern side, controlled by the Soviets. Her father and middle brother, who had gone west in search of work, cannot return home. Gerta knows it is dangerous to watch the wall, yet she can't help herself. She sees the East German soldiers with their guns trained on their own citizens; she, her family, her neighbors and friends are prisoners in their own city.But one day on her way to school, Gerta spots her father on a viewing platform on the western side, pantomiming a peculiar dance. Gerta concludes that her father wants her and Fritz to tunnel beneath the wall, out of East Berlin. However, if they are caught, the consequences will be deadly. No one can be trusted. Will Gerta and her family find their way to freedom? |
facts about night by elie wiesel: The Tale of a Niggun Elie Wiesel, 2020-11-17 Elie Wiesel’s heartbreaking narrative poem about history, immortality, and the power of song, accompanied by magnificent full-color illustrations by award-winning artist Mark Podwal. Based on an actual event that occurred during World War II. It is the evening before the holiday of Purim, and the Nazis have given the ghetto’s leaders twenty-four hours to turn over ten Jews to be hanged to “avenge” the deaths of the ten sons of Haman, the villain of the Purim story, which celebrates the triumph of the Jews of Persia over potential genocide some 2,400 years ago. If the leaders refuse, the entire ghetto will be liquidated. Terrified, they go to the ghetto’s rabbi for advice; he tells them to return the next morning. Over the course of the night the rabbi calls up the spirits of legendary rabbis from centuries past for advice on what to do, but no one can give him a satisfactory answer. The eighteenth-century mystic and founder of Hasidism, the Baal Shem Tov, tries to intercede with God by singing a niggun—a wordless, joyful melody with the power to break the chains of evil. The next evening, when no volunteers step forward, the ghetto’s residents are informed that in an hour they will all be killed. As the minutes tick by, the ghetto’s rabbi teaches his assembled community the song that the Baal Shem Tov had sung the night before. And then the voices of these men, women, and children soar to the heavens. How can the heavens not hear? |
facts about night by elie wiesel: One Generation After Elie Wiesel, 1987-09-13 Twenty years after he and his family were deported from Sighet to Auschwitz, Elie Wiesel returned to his town in search of the watch—a bar mitzvah gift—he had buried in his backyard before they left. |
facts about night by elie wiesel: Twilight Elie Wiesel, 2021-04-27 Raphael Lipkin, a professor at New York's Mountain Clinic psychiatric hospital, struggles to hide his own mental delusions and demons from his fellow staff. |
facts about night by elie wiesel: The Night Trilogy Elie Wiesel, 2008-04-15 Three works deal with a concentration camp survivor, a hostage holder in Palestine, and a recovering accident victim. |
facts about night by elie wiesel: Witness Ariel Burger, 2018 WINNER OF THE NATIONAL JEWISH BOOK AWARD--BIOGRAPHY Elie Wiesel was a towering presence on the world stage--a Nobel laureate, activist, adviser to world leaders, and the author of more than forty books, including the Oprah's Book Club selection Night. But when asked, Wiesel always said, I am a teacher first. In fact, he taught at Boston University for nearly four decades, and with this book, Ariel Burger--devoted prot g , apprentice, and friend--takes us into the sacred space of Wiesel's classroom. There, Wiesel challenged his students to explore moral complexity and to resist the dangerous lure of absolutes. In bringing together never-before-recounted moments between Wiesel and his students, Witness serves as a moral education in and of itself--a primer on educating against indifference, on the urgency of memory and individual responsibility, and on the role of literature, music, and art in making the world a more compassionate place. Burger first met Wiesel at age fifteen; he became his student in his twenties, and his teaching assistant in his thirties. In this profoundly thought-provoking and inspiring book, Burger gives us a front-row seat to Wiesel's remarkable exchanges in and out of the classroom, and chronicles the intimate conversations between these two men over the decades as Burger sought counsel on matters of intellect, spirituality, and faith, while navigating his own personal journey from boyhood to manhood, from student and assistant, to rabbi and, in time, teacher. Listening to a witness makes you a witness, said Wiesel. Ariel Burger's book is an invitation to every reader to become Wiesel's student, and witness. |
facts about night by elie wiesel: The Forgotten Elie Wiesel, 1995-01-31 Distinguished psychotherapist and survivor Elhanan Rosenbaum is losing his memory to an incurable disease. Never having spoken of the war years before, he resolves to tell his son about his past—the heroic parts as well as the parts that fill him with shame—before it is too late. Elhanan's story compels his son to go to the Romanian village where the crime that continues to haunt his father was committed. There he encounters the improbable wisdom of a gravedigger who leads him to the grave of his grandfather and to the truths that bind one generation to another. |
facts about night by elie wiesel: The Jews of Silence Elie Wiesel, 2011-08-16 In the fall of 1965 the Israeli newspaper Haaretz sent a young journalist named Elie Wiesel to the Soviet Union to report on the lives of Jews trapped behind the Iron Curtain. “I would approach Jews who had never been placed in the Soviet show window by Soviet authorities,” wrote Wiesel. “They alone, in their anonymity, could describe the conditions under which they live; they alone could tell whether the reports I had heard were true or false—and whether their children and their grandchildren, despite everything, still wish to remain Jews. From them I would learn what we must do to help . . . or if they want our help at all.” What he discovered astonished him: Jewish men and women, young and old, in Moscow, Kiev, Leningrad, Vilna, Minsk, and Tbilisi, completely cut off from the outside world, overcoming their fear of the ever-present KGB to ask Wiesel about the lives of Jews in America, in Western Europe, and, most of all, in Israel. They have scant knowledge of Jewish history or current events; they celebrate Jewish holidays at considerable risk and with only the vaguest ideas of what these days commemorate. “Most of them come [to synagogue] not to pray,” Wiesel writes, “but out of a desire to identify with the Jewish people—about whom they know next to nothing.” Wiesel promises to bring the stories of these people to the outside world. And in the home of one dissident, he is given a gift—a Russian-language translation of Night, published illegally by the underground. “‘My God,’ I thought, ‘this man risked arrest and prison just to make my writing available to people here!’ I embraced him with tears in my eyes.” |
facts about night by elie wiesel: Facts and Fears James R. Clapper, Trey Brown, 2018-05-22 New York Times bestseller The former Director of National Intelligence's candid and compelling account of the intelligence community's successes--and failures--in facing some of the greatest threats to America When he stepped down in January 2017 as the fourth United States director of national intelligence, James Clapper had been President Obama's senior intelligence adviser for six and a half years, longer than his three predecessors combined. He led the U.S. intelligence community through a period that included the raid on Osama bin Laden, the Benghazi attack, the leaks of Edward Snowden, and Russia's influence operation during the 2016 U.S. election campaign. In Facts and Fears, Clapper traces his career through the growing threat of cyberattacks, his relationships with presidents and Congress, and the truth about Russia's role in the presidential election. He describes, in the wake of Snowden and WikiLeaks, his efforts to make intelligence more transparent and to push back against the suspicion that Americans' private lives are subject to surveillance. Finally, it was living through Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election and seeing how the foundations of American democracy were--and continue to be--undermined by a foreign power that led him to break with his instincts honed through more than five decades in the intelligence profession to share his inside experience. Clapper considers such controversial questions as, Is intelligence ethical? Is it moral to intercept communications or to photograph closed societies from orbit? What are the limits of what we should be allowed to do? What protections should we give to the private citizens of the world, not to mention our fellow Americans? Are there times when intelligence officers can lose credibility as unbiased reporters of hard truths by inserting themselves into policy decisions? Facts and Fears offers a privileged look inside the U.S. intelligence community and, with the frankness and professionalism for which James Clapper is known, addresses some of the most difficult challenges in our nation's history. |
facts about night by elie wiesel: For the Dead and the Living We Must Bear Witness , 1990 |
facts about night by elie wiesel: Elli Livia Bitton Jackson, 2021-04 'Among the most moving documents I have read in years ... You will not forget it' Elie Wiesel From her small, sunny hometown between the beautiful Carpathian Mountains and the blue Danube River, Elli Friedmann was taken - at a time when most girls are growing up, having boyfriends and embarking upon the adventure of life - and thrown into the murderous hell of Hitler's Final Solution. When Elli emerged from Auschwitz and Dachau just over a year later, she was fourteen. She looked like a sixty year old. This account of horrifyingly brutal inhumanity - and dogged survival - is Elli's true story. |
facts about night by elie wiesel: A Beggar in Jerusalem Elie Wiesel, 1997-05-27 When the Six-Day War began, Elie Wiesel rushed to Israel. I went to Jerusalem because I had to go somewhere, I had to leave the present and bring it back to the past. You see, the man who came to Jerusalem then came as a beggar, a madman, not believing his eyes and ears, and above all, his memory. This haunting novel takes place in the days following the Six-Day War. A Holocaust survivor visits the newly reunited city of Jerusalem. At the Western Wall he encounters the beggars and madmen who congregate there every evening, and who force him to confront the ghosts of his past and his ties to the present. Weaving together myth and mystery, parable and paradox, Wiesel bids the reader to join him on a spiritual journey back and forth in time, always returning to Jerusalem. |
facts about night by elie wiesel: Night Of The Mist Eugene Heimler, 2022-10-27 This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant. |
facts about night by elie wiesel: Elie Wiesel Linda N. Bayer, Jean Silverman, 2015-12-15 A survivor of one of modern history’s most horrific events, Elie Wiesel has spent his life ensuring that the world never forgets the Holocaust. Sent to Auschwitz during World War II, young Elie was forced to live in profoundly inhumane conditions ruled by terrifying guards. Eventually liberated, Wiesel never shook the injustice of what happened to his family and 6 million other Jews. His training as a journalist enabled him to write the seminal book Night, a memoir of his experience at Auschwitz and Buchenwald concentration camps. Elie Wiesel traces the remarkable life of a tireless advocate for human rights. |
facts about night by elie wiesel: None of Us Will Return Charlotte Delbo, 1968 The horrors of a concentration camp are described in free verse and rhythmic prose. Through the personal experiences of Charlotte Delbo, the reader enters a world of endless agony, where all individuals are bound together in the wordless fraternity of those doomed to die. |
facts about night by elie wiesel: A Study Guide (New Edition) for Elie Wiesel's "Night" Gale, Cengage, A Study Guide (New Edition) for Elie Wiesel's Night, excerpted from Gale's acclaimed Novels for Students. This concise study guide includes plot summary; character analysis; author biography; study questions; historical context; suggestions for further reading; and much more. For any literature project, trust Novels for Students for all of your research needs. |
facts about night by elie wiesel: Responses to Elie Wiesel Harry J. Cargas, B'nai B'rith. Anti-defamation League, 1978 |
facts about night by elie wiesel: Night Elie Wiesel, 2006-01-16 Presents a true account of the author's experiences as a Jewish boy in a Nazi concentration camp. |
facts about night by elie wiesel: The Fifth Son Elie Wiesel, 2011-09-07 Reuven Tamiroff, a Holocaust survivor, has never been able to speak about his past to his son, a young man who yearns to understand his father’s silence. As campuses burn amidst the unrest of the Sixties and his own generation rebels, the son is drawn to his father’s circle of wartime friends in search of clues to the past. Finally discovering that his brooding father has been haunted for years by his role in the murder of a brutal SS officer just after the war, young Tamiroff learns that the Nazi is still alive. Haunting, poetic, and very contemporary, The Fifth Son builds to an unforgettable climax as the son sets out to complete his father’s act of revenge. |
facts about night by elie wiesel: What I Know For Sure Oprah Winfrey, 2014-09-02 The inspirational wisdom Oprah Winfrey shares in her monthly O., The Oprah Magazine column updated, curated, and collected for the first time in a beautiful keepsake book. As a creative force, student of the human heart and soul, and champion of living the life you want, Oprah Winfrey stands alone. Over the years, she has made history with a legendary talk show - the highest-rated program of its kind, launched her own television network, become the nation's only African-American billionaire, and been awarded both an honorary degree by Harvard University and the Presidential Medal of Freedom. From all her experiences, she has gleaned life lessons—which, for fourteen years, she's shared in O, The Oprah Magazine's widely popular What I Know For Sure column, a monthly source of inspiration and revelation. Now, for the first time, these thoughtful gems have been revised, updated, and collected in What I Know For Sure, a beautiful cloth bound book with a ribbon marker, packed with insight and revelation from Oprah Winfrey. Organized by theme—joy, resilience, connection, gratitude, possibility, awe, clarity, and power—these essays offer a rare, powerful and intimate glimpse into the heart and mind of one of the world's most extraordinary women—while providing readers a guide to becoming their best selves. Candid, moving, exhilarating, uplifting, and frequently humorous, the words Oprah shares in What I Know For Sure shimmer with the sort of truth that readers will turn to again and again. |
facts about night by elie wiesel: The Holocaust and the Literary Imagination Lawrence L. Langer, 1977 A critical and interpretive study of the literature of atrocity, major imaginative writing inspired and informed by the Holocaust, examining works in English translation by such writers as Aichinger, Boll, Kosinski, Lind, Sachs, Schwarz-Bart, and Wiesel. |
facts about night by elie wiesel: Asylum Judy Bolton-Fasman, 2021-08-24 How much do we really know about the lives of our parents and the secrets lodged in their past? Judy Bolton-Fasman's fascinating saga, Asylum: A Memoir of Family Secrets, recounts the search for answers to the mysteries embedded in the lives of her Cuban-born mother, Matilde Alboukrek Bolton and her elusive, Yale-educated father, K. Harold Bolton. In the prefatory chapter, Burn This, Judy receives a thick letter from her father and conjectures that the contents will reveal the long hidden explanations, confessions, and secrets that will unlock her father's cryptic past. Just as she is about to open the portal to her father's transtiendas, his dark hidden secrets, Harold Bolton phones Judy and instructs her to burn the still unopened letter. With the flick of a match, Judy ignites her father's unread documents, effectively destroying the answers to long held questions that surround her parents' improbable marriage and their even more secretive lives. Judy Bolton, girl detective, embarks on the life-long exploration of her bifurcated ancestry; Judy inherits a Sephardic, Spanish/Ladino-speaking culture from her mother and an Ashkenazi, English-only, old-fashioned American patriotism from her father. Amid the Bolton household's cultural, political, and psychological confusion, Judy is mystified by her father's impenetrable silence; and, similarly confounded by her mother's fabrications, not the least of which involve rumors of a dowry pay-off and multiple wedding ceremonies for the oddly mismatched 40-year-old groom and the 24-year-old bride. Contacting former associates, relatives, and friends; accessing records through the Freedom of Information Act; traveling to Cuba to search for clues, and even reciting the Mourner's Kaddish for a year to gain spiritual insight into her father; these decades-long endeavors do not always yield the answers Judy wanted and sometimes the answers themselves lead her to ask new questions. Among Asylum's most astonishing, unsolved mysteries is Ana Hernandez's appearance at the family home on Asylum Avenue in West Hartford, Connecticut. Ana is an exchange student from Guatemala whom Judy comes to presume to be her paternal half-sister. In seeking information about Ana, Judy's investigations prove to be much like her entire enterprise--both enticing and frustrating. Was Ana just a misconstrued memory, or is she a still living piece of the puzzle that Judy has spent her adult life trying to solve? Readers will relish every step and stage of Judy's investigations and will begin toshare in her obsession to obtain answers to the mysteries that have haunted her life.The suspense, the clairvoyant prophecies, the discoveries, the new leads, the dead-ends, the paths not taken--all capture our attention in this absorbing and fascinating memoir. |
facts about night by elie wiesel: Elie Wiesel Robert McAfee Brown, 1983-01-15 Upon presenting the 1986 Nobel Prize for Peace to Elie Wiesel, Egil Aarvick, chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Prize Committee, hailed him as a messenger to mankind--not with a message of hate and revenge but with one of brotherhood and atonement. Elie Wiesel: Messenger to All Humanity, first published in 1983, echoes this theme and still affirms that message, a call to both Christians and Jews to face the tragedy of the Holocaust and begin again. |
facts about night by elie wiesel: Number the Stars Lois Lowry, 2011 In Nazi-occupied Denmark, ten-year-old Annemarie Johansen is called upon for a selfless act of bravery to help save her best friend from a terrible fate. Winner of the Newbery Medal, newly reissued in the Essential Modern Classics range. They plan to arrest all the Danish Jews. They plan to take them away. And we have been told that they may come tonight. It is 1943 and life in Copenhagen is becoming complicated for Annemarie. There are food shortages and curfews, and soldiers on every corner. But it is even worse for her Jewish best friend, Ellen, as the Nazis continue their brutal campaign. With Ellen's life in danger, Annemarie must summon all her courage to help stage a daring escape. Inspired by true events of the Second World War, this gripping novel brings the past vividly to life for today's readers. |
facts about night by elie wiesel: The Testament Elie Wiesel, Mark H. Podwal, |
facts about night by elie wiesel: Bright Lights, Dark Nights Stephen Emond, 2016-08-09 Walter Wilcox has never been in love. That is, until he meets Naomi, and sparks, and clever jokes, fly. But when his cop dad is caught in a racial profiling scandal, Walter and Naomi, who is African American, are called out at school, home, and onlin |
facts about night by elie wiesel: Night - Elie Wiesel Harold Bloom, 2009 An important work on the Holocaust by a concentration camp survivor. |
facts about night by elie wiesel: Major 20th-century Writers , 1991 |
facts about night by elie wiesel: The Struggle for Understanding Victoria Nesfield, Philip Smith, 2019-08-01 Elie Wiesel (1928–2016) was one of the most important literary voices to emerge from the Holocaust. The Nazis took the lives of most of his family, destroyed the community in which he was raised, and subjected him to ghettoization, imprisonment in Auschwitz and Buchenwald, and a death march. It is remarkable not only that Wiesel survived and found a way to write about his experiences, but that he did so with elegance and profundity. His novels grapple with questions of tradition, memory, trauma, madness, atrocity, and faith. The Struggle for Understanding examines Wiesel's literary, religious, and cultural roots and the indelible impact of the Holocaust on his storytelling. Grouped in sections on Hasidic origins, the role of the Other, theology and tradition, and later works, the chapters cover the entire span of Wiesel's career. Books analyzed include the novels Dawn, The Forgotten, The Gates of the Forest, The Town Beyond the Wall, The Testament, The Time of the Uprooted, The Sonderberg Case, and Hostage, as well as his memoir, Night. What emerges is a portrait of Wiesel's work in its full literary richness. |
facts about night by elie wiesel: Jagendorf's Foundry Siegfried Jagendorf, 1991 Let us take advantage of this historic moment and cleanse the soil of Romania ... These words began the Romanian Holocaust in 1941. Deported Jews were expected to perish. So it might have been for the thousands sent to the German-occupied Soviet territory of Moghilev, were it not for the intervention of a Jewish engineer, 56-year-old Siegfried Jagendorf, who was among the deportees. This book tells the incredible story, left untold for fifty years, of a sabotaged and abandoned ironworks that became the instrument of salvation for 15,000 Romanian Jews. - Jacket flap. |