Book Report On Night Essay, Research Paper

Title of Work: Night

Country/Culture: Eastern European

Literary Period: 20th Century

Type of literature: Autobiography

Author: Elie Wiesel

Authorial Information:

Eile Wiesel was born in Transalvanya. He was asked many times to write about his experinces in the Holocaust. He waited ten years after he was freed from Buchenwald, he didn’t want to write a hate-filled account of his experince. He recived the Noble Prize for Night in 1992. He lives in the United states and teaches at Boston University.

Setting:

Night takes place in World War II in the 1940’s. It starts in Sighet, Hingary. When the Nazis arrive in Hunary and the Jews are move into the ghetto. After a short period of time they where moved to Birkenau, an area in Auschwitz. After some time in Auschwitz, Elie and his father were moved to Buna. They were then canged two more times first to Gleiwitz and finally to Buchenwald where he was freed.

Theme:

One theme was survival. People risked their lives during an air to get a drop more of soup, sons killed fathers for a ration of bread, rippin clothes off the dead (or believed to be deid) to stay warm!

Characters:

** Elie Wiesel is the author of the book and the story is told from his point of view. He is a Jewish Hungarian who was taken to Birkenau in 1944 at the age of fifteen. Wiesel shares his horrifying experience and gives detailed descriptions of life in concentration camps. To the Nazis Wiesel was a good worker since he was young and strong. Through this horrible experience Wiesel grows up.

**Chlomo Wiesel was Elie’s father. He was a valued member in their Jewish community and many people came to him for advice. He remained strong throughout the entire ordeal even though he was getting old and the small rations were insufficient. He eventually died, although it’s unknown whether he died in his sleep or if he was taken to the crematory still alive.

**Juliek is a Polish violinist who is also a prisoner in the concentration camp with Elie and his father. Juliek loves music and dreams of being able to play Beethoven, but Jews aren’t allowed to play German music. When forced to leave Buna since the lines are drawing near, he takes his violin with him and plays for the dying men outside Gleiwitz. When Elie awoke Juliek had passed away, his violin beside him.

**Moshe the Beadle was a poor, religious man who lived amongst the Jews of Sighet. Before he was deported he sang and chanted. He was also Elie’s master of the cabbala. When he came back from the orest of Galacia his whole demeanor had changed. He told stories of how the Gestapo had killed all of the deportees by mercilessly shooting each of them and leaving them for dead. No one believed him and thought he had lost his mind even though he tried many times without avail to get them to listen.

Quotes:

I forgot what quotes I had. I turned them in on a sheet of paper on the tenth of September, I hope you still have them.

Glossary:

Hasidic~a secton of the Jewish relilgious

Cabbala~a secret science of the Jewish rabis tointerpret the hidden meaning of the

Pentateuch

Talmud~the biik which cintains the whole body of the Jewish civil and canonical laws and traditions, with the commentaries and speculations of the Rabbis, consisting of two parts, the

Mishnah and Gemara.

Gestapo~German secret police.

Lorries~a long four-wheeled wagon without sides: a miner’s handcart

Fascist~an advocate of fascism

Ghetto~section of a city in which a large number of Jews dwell.