1. By Elie Wiesel

2.  First person retrospective point of view.  Jews of Sighet  1941 – war time.  Main character – very religious  Father – “was a cultured, rather unsentimental man. There was never any display of emotion, even at home. He was more concerned with others than his own family.” A highly regarded man.

3.  Wiesel’s family – four children; three girls and a boy (the main character). Hilda, Bea, Elie, Tzipora.  Parents ran a shop where Hilda and Bea helped; the narrator spent his time studying.  Moshe the Beadle – master of cabbala; noticed the narrator weeping while praying. Philosophical – “...every question possessed a power that did not lie in the answer.”  Elie spent many hours in the synagogue.

4.  Moshe – foreign Jew – expelled by the Hungarian police – crammed into a cattle car for deportation.  Reason given for deportation was “war”. Days later they heard and readily believed that the deportees were working in Galacia.  Figurative language and irony – “a wind of calmness and reassurance blew through our houses.”

5.  Moshe returned. Told how he escaped the Gestapo who had taken charge of them, made them dig large graves, and then killed them. He escaped because he was wounded in the leg and taken for dead. “Babies were thrown up into the air and machine gunners used them as targets.”  Moshe was no longer the same person.  Nobody listened to Moshe, for they thought he only wanted their pity (irony & foreshadowing).

6.  Moshe was their warning and they did not listen – “I wanted to come back... to tell you the story of my death. So that you could prepare yourselves while there was still time.”  Narrator notes, “Jews... Were waiting for better days, which would not be long in coming.” (irony)  Life was normal – Elie’s father carried on with business concerns and his mother busied herself in the search for a husband for Hilda.

7.  Passage of time – “Thus the year 1943 passed by.”  Spring of 1944 – believed Hitler would never be able to harm them – false sense of security.  Still possible to emigrate to Palestine at this point but Elie’s father felt he was, “too old to start from scratch again in another country.”  German troops in Hungarian territory.  German soldiers arrived and even moved in with the Jewish people – the Kahn family – optimism – he bought Madame Kahn chocolates.

8.  No fear in the face of danger; suggests an innocence, a naiveté, a belief that human beings are fundamentally good (builds suspense).  Passover – closed synagogues; leaders arrested; Jews unable to leave their houses for three days; must wear a yellow star.  Jews no longer permitted to go to restaurants; to travel; to walk the streets after 6 pm.  Two ghettos set up, fenced with barbed wire.  Jews looked at the ghettos as being self- contained (irony).

9.  People believed this situation would remain until the end of the war, with the arrival of the Red Army. AUTHORIAL INTRUSION – “...it was illusion.  Elie’s father – meeting of the council – his mother had a “premonition of evil.”  Meeting – deportation – leave the following day; rumoured they would go to Hungary as the front was too close. Each person could take 1 bag for clothes and food – nothing else.

10.  Knocking on the blocked window – missed opportunity to escape.  Deportation commenced on Sunday. “They went by... Cringing like beaten dogs.” (simile)  Abandonment – “Doors and windows gaped onto the emptiness.”  Wiesel family scheduled to leave in 2 days. Elie continued to pray; his father wept openly.  Called “lazy swine” by the police – “It was from that moment that I began to hate them

11. and my hate is still the only link between us today. They were our first oppressors. They were the first faces of hell and death.”  Moved to small ghetto – morale in the streets became optimistic again.  Opportunity for safety offered by old servant. Father refused to go and family refused to be separated.  On a positive note, people were nicer to each other as all social rank had been discarded. They were all in the same social category

12. in the eyes of their oppressors – worthless.  Last supper on Friday evening – “We were, we felt, gathered for the last time around the family table.”  Reference to title – Night – a fear-filled atmosphere in contrast to the optimism felt earlier; no one prayed for this night to pass quickly.  Moved to the synagogue. Conditions uncomfortable and crowded.  Sunday morning – 80 people boarded each cattle car; each car was sealed; any escapee would be shot; a few loaves of bread and buckets of water provided.

13.  Important – use of the JOURNEY MOTIF. Usually a journey involves a degree of self- discovery. In this case, the journey involves fear, horror and anxiety.  The journey provides UNITY as the plot progresses.  Atmosphere – fear; tension; oppression.  Journey: Sighet; ghetto; cattle cars.

14.  Journey motif – train ride to Auschwitz.  Loss of decorum on cattle cars: took turns to sit; no one could lie down; unbearable heat; no water two days into trip; young people flirted openly in the dark; saved most food – “tomorrow might be worse.”  They quickly realized they were not staying in Hungary. Hungarian lieutenant gave the order to remove any gold jewellery.  Jews told they were the property of the German army.

15.  Doors of the cars were nailed shut.  Foreshadowing and irony – Madame Schachter. Out of her mind with fear and anxiety – separated from her husband and two eldest sons. Hysterical crying. Visions of fire (foreshadows crematories). Emphasis on blackness of the night – foreshadowing dark, uncertain future). Eventually forced to sit and gagged. Terror increased. Hit her – “madness” has set in.

16.  Time describes as “an endless night.”  Reached Auschwitz – told they would be staying at a labour camp.  Irony – “Conditions were good... Families would not be split...”  “The barometer of confidence soared.” (Irony)  Train slowly moved again – 15 minutes later arrived at the camp – Madame Schacter started screaming again – this time, they all see her vision – no longer fantasy.

17.  “We looked at the flames in the darkness. There was an abominable odour floating in the air... In front of us flames. In the air that sweet smell of burning flesh.”  Midnight – arrived at Birkenau, reception centre for Auschwitz.  Important – use of premonition to develop suspense.  Atmosphere of fear: predominance of night; evil omens; arrival at Birkenau; burning bodies; heat and closeness of bodies inside cattle cars.

18.  “Cherished items... And our illusions” were left behind in the train.  Men separated from the women: “Eight words spoken quietly, indifferently, without emotion. Eight short, simple words. Yet that was the moment when I parted from my mother. I had not the time to think, but I already felt the pressure of my father’s hand: we were alone.”  Age: pretend he was 18; father pretend he was 40.

19.  Standing before Dr. Mengele – selection. Elie and his father told to move to the left line – unsure whether it was the “better” side.  “Babies! Yes, I saw it – saw it with my own eyes – those children in the flames. Is it surprising that I could not sleep after that? Sleep had fled from my eyes.”  When Elie suggested that humanity would never tolerate such injustice, his father stated “Humanity is not concerned with us. Today anything is allowed.” (Thematic statement)

20.  Important quote which signifies change: “Never shall I that first night, the first night in camp, which has turned my life into one long night, seven times cursed and seven times sealed. Never shall I forget that smoke. Never shall I forget the little faces of children, whose bodies I saw turned into wreaths of smoke beneath a silent blue sky. Never shall I forget those flames which consumed my faith forever... Never shall I forget those moments which murdered my God and my soul and turned my dreams to dust.”

21.  They were moved to barracks and stripped; hair shaved off; ran through petrol. Disregard for human dignity.  Everything was blurred as in a fog.  Instinct for self-preservation surfaced.  Elie watched his father: “How he had changed. His eyes had grown dim.”  Elie: “A dark flame had entered into my soul and devoured it.”

22.  Told by a guard that Auschwitz was a concentration camp and those who do not work go straight to the flames.  Sign: “Warning: Danger of Death”. Cruel guards wielding whips, revolvers, machine guns.  Marched to another camp – Auschwitz – “Work is Liberty”.  Assigned to Block 17 – given coffee and new clothes. Elie refused his soup: “I was still the spoiled child I had always been.”

23.  Engraving – Elie became A-7713. Stripped of identity, merely a number among many other numbers.  After 3 weeks in Auschwitz, a new man was given the duty of being the prisoner in charge – this man was savage and brutal.  Elie lies to Stien in order to give the man hope.  Incredible faith of the Jewish people – God testing them.

24.  Elie and his father maintained positive thoughts of mother and sisters; they clung to their hopes because otherwise they would lose their will to live.  Transported to another camp called Buna.  Journey: Birkenau; Auschwitz; Buna.

25.  Buna – building unit not good – foreshadowing.  Young children were sometimes objects of affection for the homosexuals at Buna.  Assistant tried to get Elie’s shoes in exchange for placement in a good unit; Elie refused; he was later forced to give them up.  Dental exam – look for gold dental work. Elie had a gold crown so name added to a list.  Elie requested to work in same unit as his father.

26.  When Elie summoned to have crown extracted, he pretended to be sick; given a week long reprieve and then a second one. Dentist found to have been running a private traffic.  Elie was savagely beaten as he got in the way of Idek’s wild frenzy; he was comforted by one of the few females in the warehouse who passed herself off as an Aryan (preferred race).  Wiesel jumps ahead to many years after the war when he sees this woman in Paris (authorial intrusion – we know he survives).

27.  Elie’s father becomes the victim of Idek’s madness – note Elie’s reaction – angry at his father for not knowing how to avoid Idek’s outbreak. “This is what concentration camp life had made of me.”  Franek, a foreman, knew how to get Elie’s crown. Punished his father. Elie’s crown removed with a rusty spoon.  Elie walked in on Idek with a young girl – punishment – whipped 25 times – evident cruelty.

28.  Nice thematic statement: “Terror stronger than hunger.” The alert – man committed suicide for a ration of soup. The bombing of Buna – cheerful event.  Man hanged for stealing soup during alert – Elie noted that the soup tasted good that night (recognition that it was important to be alive).  Killing of three prisoners – one being a young boy described as “the sad eyed angel.” “...being so light the child was still alive.”

29.  “For more than half an hour he stayed there, struggling between life and death, dying in slow agony under our eyes. And we had to look him full in the face. He was still alive when I passed in front of him. His tongue was still red, his eyes were not yet glazed.”  Elie continues to lose faith in God.  How much misery can the human spirit withstand?

30.  Summer nearly over – “Night was falling.”  Elie was still very angry with God for the suffering around him.  Elie questions his faith – in CONTRAST to the earlier religious scholar.  “I was no longer capable of lamentation … without love or mercy, I had ceased to be anything but ashes, yet I felt myself to be stronger than the Almighty, to whom my life had been tied for so long. I stood among that praying congregation observing it like a stranger.”

31.  Elie observes his father: “Nothing. Not the shadow of an expression. Beaten.” A shadow of his former self.  Irony – deciding whether to fast during Yom Kippur – the entire year involved forced fasting.  New Year’s Day brought an unexpected “gift” of selection by the SS. Elie concerned his father would not pass (he did though).  Another selection – Elie’s father told to remain for this one.

32.  Inheritance – a spoon and a knife.  Elie was afraid to return home from work as he thought he might find himself alone. Suspense.  Once again, his father passed selection. Inheritance returned – keeping it might tempt fate.  Movement to winter – unforgiving, dreary setting becomes worse.  Concern – swelling in Elie’s foot – operation – white sheets.

33.  Red Army advancing on Buna.  Faceless one: “I’ve got more faith in Hitler than in anyone else. He’s the only one who’s keeping his promises to the Jewish peoples…”(Hitler promised annihilation of the Jewish people, a promise he was determined to keep).  Evacuation of Buna – decision of Elie to stay in the infirmary or be evacuated with the others.  They decide to leave.

34.  Irony – the fate of those left behind at the infirmary was to be liberated by Russian troops two days after the evacuation! Elie recorded another last “night”.  Hope revived – could hear Russian artillery in the distance.  “It seemed that an even darker night was waiting for us on the other side.”

35.  Cold wind – cruel, unrelenting nature parallels the SS.  Note mechanical behavior exhibited by prisoners, as if they lost all semblance of humanity.  “Death wrapped itself around me.” He was saved by his father’s intervention.  “A great tidal wave of men came rolling onward and would have crushed me like an ant.” Overwhelmed both physically and emotionally.

36.  “We were masters of nature, masters of the world.” They had overcome so many conflicts, yet they still faced misery and heartbreak; the ordeal was not over, but they (the Jewish people) would endure. Theme.  Covered 42 miles; abandoned village; inviting nature of the snow and his father’s warning: “Don’t let yourself be overcome by sleep … You might sleep for good.” Around Elie everything was “dancing a dance of death.”

37.  People died because they had to die.  “Death was moving in, silently, without violence.”  Description of his father awakening: “He stared all around him in a circle as though he had suddenly decided to draw up an inventory of his universe, to find out exactly where he was, in what place, and why. Then he smiled.” “I shall always remember that smile. From which world did it come?”

38.  “The snow continued to fall in thick flakes over the corpses.”  Rabbi looking for his son: “And now – when the end seemed near – fate had separated them.” Foreshadowing?  Elie remembers seeing the son run from his father – “rid of the burden … which could lessen his chances of survival.”  As they left village, sons abandoned their fathers’ remains without a tear – no longer felt compassion or a sense of loyalty?

39.  Survival of the fittest – the cold killed where the SS would have before.  Horizon – Gleiwitz – irony – the prisoners wanted to reach it as quickly as possible.  People stepping on each other; cries of mercy.  Juliek – intent on protecting his violin (a symbol of the civilized, cultured life that was once known).  Elie’s father was still alive; survived the perilous journey.

40.  Elie hears a violin: “He was playing his life. The whole of his life was gliding on the strings – his hopes, his charred past, his extinguished future. He played as he would never play again.” When Elie awoke, he found Juliek slumped over, dead.  Three days at Gleiwitz without food and water; Selection – Elie’s father sent to the left with the weaker prisoners. Elie went to retrieve him – confusion ensued. They managed to make it back to the right, though others who attempted this were killed in the process. A close call.

41.  Prisoners walked half and hour to the train.  Snow fell on their blankets. They were given bread but no water. Not allowed to bend down so they ate snow off each others back.  Train arrived – 100 men placed in each cattle car because now so thin. Physical appearance mirrors spirit – diminished as a result of their ordeal.  Journey – Buna; abandoned village; Gleiwitz.

42.  The men were no longer seen as functioning human beings, as their spirits had been defeated. Was there no longer a distinction between the living and the dead?  Elie concerned that his father was dead. Train stopped to throw out the dead – thankfully Elie managed to wake his father in time.  Bodies stripped of clothing and thrown out.  No distinction between day and night – “The days were like nights, and the nights left the dregs of their darkness in our souls.”

43.  Ten days and nights travelling. Stampede when workmen threw a piece of bread into the car – for entertainment.  Years later, same spectacle at Aden. Coins tossed to natives and two children became “engaged in death struggle.” The irony that people fail to know their own cruelty.  Story of son who stole bread from his dead father, having failed to recognize him earlier. He died as the other men jumped him for that bread.

44.  Third night of the journey – an attack on Elie; motivation unknown.  Death cries described as “the cry of a wounded animal” – suggests a loss of human dignity. The cry became contagious.  Reached their destination – Buchenwald. Note contrast: one hundred men had entered the cattle car days before; only a handful survived the journey.  Journey: Gleiwitz; cattle car; Buchenwald

45.  Elie’s father wished to die. Elie : “I could have wept with rage. Having lived through so much, could I leave my father to die now?”  Elie describes his father as childlike – reduced/diminished as a result of his ordeal.  Prisoners physically, emotionally and spiritually broken.  Alert sounded – primary instinct was survival; Elie separated from his father. Initial thought, “Don’t let me find him.” However, he was immediately ashamed for having such a thought.

46.  Located his father after several hours of searching “burning with fever.”  Primitive instincts – Elie attacked the coffee line-up like a wild beast (animal imagery).  Elie’s father wasn’t given any soup because he would “die soon anyway.” Elie shared his “with a heavy heart.”  Elie’s father struck down with dysentry (intestinal inflammation). Elie realized that death would soon claim his father; however, he continued to give the sick man hope.

47.  Elie traded a ration of bread for a bunk beside his father. Cruel comment by doctor: “Dysentry? That’s not my business. I’m a surgeon. Make way for the others.”  Elie’s father abused by the other prisoners; food and water stolen. He was dealt a sharp blow to the head by a German officer.  January 28, 1945 – Elie went to sleep haunted by the image of his father’s blood stained face. The next morning his father’s body was removed and taken to the crematory. “He may still have been breathing.”

48.  Elie could not weep for his father and was very much bothered by this.

49.  Elie called Buchenwald home until April 11, 1945. After his father’s death he felt that life “no longer mattered.”  Elie’s only desire was food. He no longer thought of his family. Survival was his sole concern.  Evacuation begins – daily, several thousand prisoners left the camp.  April 10 – final evacuation scheduled to take place. Postponed until next day due to an alert.

50.  At this point, the prisoners were literally starving – had not eaten for six whole days.  April 11 – all prisoners moved to the assembly place in the morning; a resistance movement appeared out of nowhere.  The battle lasted two hours; the SS fled the scene.  At 6 pm an American tank appeared at the gates of Buchenwald.  Fist concern of the freed prisoners was food.

51.  Their second main concern was getting rest/sleep.  No one thought of revenge.  Three days later – Elie found himself very ill with food poisoning. Dramatic irony – he had spent two weeks fighting death; had he survived his ordeal only to die as a free man?  Elie description of himself as a corpse – he had not seen his reflection in a mirror since he left the ghetto years before.

52.  “From the depths of the mirror, a corpse gazed back at me. The look in his eyes, as they stared into mine, has never left me.”  Wiesel has learned important truths: (1) that humanity has a dark side. (2) that nothing in life can be taken for granted. Journey: Buchenwald; LIBERATION.