Response #3

To begin with, I think that the memoir Night by Elie Wiesel is very eye opening to what the Jewish people had to go through during the Holocaust. I cannot even believe that they were treated this bad. On page 86 I thought it was horrible that Elie said that death “fascinated” him. At fifteen or sixteen years old people should not have to think about death, they should be excited about the long life ahead of them. Next, Elie said, “Nobody wanted to give up now, just before the end, so close to our destination,” (92) which I think people can relate to with any circumstance even if it isn’t to this extent. I say this because everyone wants to overcome the challenges they face in life. If you give up before you finish you don’t get any satisfaction.

One part that I can relate to a movie I have seen is when Juliek is playing the violin when all the Jewish people are confined in the barracks. This automatically reminded me of the movie Titanic, when the string quartet is playing songs as the ship is sinking. Both situations are heartbreaking because they know they are close to death. Another part I hated reading was when Elie said, “Then two ‘gravediggers’ grabbed him by the head and feet and threw him from the wagon, like a sack of flour” (99). It is not fair that after being put through the torture of being starved, abused, etc., they are thrown like dolls out of a train instead of getting a proper burial. This is also shown when it says, “Beneath our feet there lay men, crushed, trampled, underfoot, dying. Nobody paid attention to them” (89). This is crazy because if someone was on the ground hurt in a normal situation, people would stop to help, but because they have been through so much cruelty they don’t even care anymore if they experience death.

Another thing I found kind of ironic was that when they were marching Elie’s father wouldn’t let him sit to rest, however when they reached Buchenwald, his father wanted to rest, but Elie wouldn’t let him. Towards the end of the book, Elie and his father somewhat switch roles of father and son. Elie must take care of his father to help him survive as long as he possibly can, when he is only a teenager. After Elie’s father became bedridden Elie said, “I listened to him shouting at them that they were lazy good-for-nothings who only wanted to stay in bed” (109), talking about the doctor seeing the sick patients. This statement is nasty because if he had been through what the Jewish people had been through he’d be in rough shape too. He is in no position to criticize them for falling ill. Lastly, at the end when they were liquidating the camp, it was not right that they were not given food for six days. How were they even able to survive that with being extremely weak to begin with? Although I did not enjoy reading this book because it was too gruesome, I believe Elie Wiesel did a great job of explaining the Holocaust and spreading the word so something like it would never occur again.