“It is hope that compels man to hold on to one more day of life, because that day may be the day of liberation” (Borowski 121). This is the very reason that the prisoners of concentration camps continued to fight day after day for their life. They continued to hold on to this hope. In the book, Tadeusz Borowski discusses his experiences within the concentration camp, and he spends much of his time trying to make sense of the situation in which he is in. He looks at the men running the camps, and he looks at the others imprisoned in the camp with him. He realizes that everyone does what they think they have to for themselves. He comes to the conclusion that people lack humanity in situations as these in order to endure the hardships. He examines …show more content…
Although this seems to be a very unlikely possibility to most, Borowski seems to think these men may have a clouded perception of what they are doing. He discusses this likelihood in the chapter about Sergeant Schillinger, because during the last moments of his life he was calling out and asking “what have I done to deserve such suffering” (Borowski 146). Borowski speaks of the “strange irony of fate” (146) experienced in the moment of Schillinger’s death. This man had caused so much pain and suffering to so many others, yet he did not understand any reason for him to suffer. He saw no wrong for the things that he had done, and he was simply following commands. This was this man’s job, and he may have seen it as his duty to support his family. It is very ironic that this man that had caused so much pain did not think he deserved to suffer. However, he probably was doing what he thought was right. He worked for men that made him believe that these prisoners were in the camps because of crimes they committed or because they were for some reason less than a human being. This was just his job in the hierarchy of power established by the …show more content…
He says, “The world is ruled by power,” (Borowski 168) and the same goes for the camps. “The weak work for the strong, and if they have no strength or will to work—then let them steal, or let them die” (Borowski 168). He makes this seem like any other process in life. It seems so simple when he puts it in this way. It is as if this is how it should be, or like there is nothing that can be done about it. The prisoners must work for the Nazis unless they have no strength left, and then they die. He also suggested that power is attained through acquiring money, and that money is obtained through the mistreatment of other people. So, he concludes that the concentration camp is just an organization of people gaining power through the exploitation of other people. In order for someone to have power, they must have power over someone or something. The soldiers had power over the prisoners, and even some prisoners had power over prisoners. He also mentions the word “organized” a lot throughout the book leading to the assumption that it was all just a process or a system that must go on for