Premium Essay

The Holocaust In Elie Wiesel's 'Night'

Submitted By
Words 630
Pages 3
Life is Beautiful/ Night Compare & Contrast Essay
During WWII one of the most horrific, crimes of mankind occurred under the leadership of Adolf Hitler. This crime was the Holocaust, which imprisoned many Jewish people in internment camps, and slaughtered over six million. In the book Night by Elie Wiesel and Roberto Benigni’s Life is Beautiful they both convey their message about the holocaust in similar and different ways.
In the book and movie they both had a motif of god, and his relationship with man. In the book Wiesel reflects on god in many ways. During the beginning of the book
Elie was very religious, he even said “by day I studied Talmud and by night I would run to synagogue and weep over the destruction of the temple” (Wiesel 3). This shows the Wiesel was very religious and did infact believe in God at the beginning of the book, but throughout the book Elie does begin to question God and even …show more content…
In the book a major scene where music was introduced was when Juliek, the violinist, plays a fragment of a Beethoven concerto, which Elie says he could never forget. In one of the ugliest of places, Juliek plays a beautiful last song and touches all those around him. In the movie music is more conveyed in a romantic happy way. Guido sees his wife, Dora at the opera where the song being sung was Barcarolle, which is about a night of love, as to Night being more of a night of death. Along with the song being sung at the opera, Guido also plays the song for his wife in the concentration camp, telling her that he still loves her and that himself and Joshua were alright.
Both the book Night by Elie Wiesel and the movie Life is Beautiful have some same messages and motifs conveyed with some same and different ways. They both convey the holocaust in different tones and ways, but both tell a good story. While Night seems to focus on the death of the holocaust, Life is Beautiful shows the life that came out of it

Similar Documents

Premium Essay

The Holocaust In Elie Wiesel's Night

...Elie Wiesel’s Night, a touching story about a boy named Elie and what happened to him during the holocaust. The holocaust was a horrendous genocide of anyone who the Germans considered inadequate or less than. The main group of people targeted were the Jewish. They killed men, woman, elderly, even children. Elie witnessed this first hand as he tell us in his story Night. Imagine being his age and having everything you know and have taken from you. Living as livestock, not having an opinion, being forced to do everything. Even when treated like this, they still kept moving and pushing their way through. Constantly fighting to not be animals. In this situation, the “Jews” do not want to be the animals they are made out to be so, the Blockalteste...

Words: 322 - Pages: 2

Premium Essay

Remember The Holocaust In Elie Wiesel's Night

...“He was tortured, Remained behind confinement, Remained silent, Death found three gallows, Three black ravens aimed at us, Three prisoners in chains. All eyes were pale, The shadow took his place, Three chairs were tipped over, Silence on the horizon, The two men were hanging.” These are the words of a blackout poem created out of a page of text from the book ‘Night’. The book night is all about a Elie Wiesel's experience in Auschwitz concentration camp during the Holocaust.He never forgot about his experiences because he lived through it. But we shouldn't forget the Holocaust either. It is important to remember the Holocaust so history doesn’t repeat itself and to bring awareness to current situations. The Holocaust is a major part of...

Words: 535 - Pages: 3

Premium Essay

The Holocaust In Elie Wiesel's Night

...many more in the death camps. There are many survivors of this tragedy, which is now known as the Holocaust. A survivor is Elie Wiesel;(change to a period) he was fifteen at the time, along with his family that he was shortly with after arriving. He was separated from most of his family. He only had his father left, and then went to the work camps. He wrote his novel, Night, a story of his tragedy, losing his family at a young age, and the inside story of what was going on in the death camps. A quote form the story Night is “I could never forget the smoke, the faces on the children; I could never forget the flames that consumes my faith” (34 Wiesel). An example of mankind being evil as shown in the novel Night is by staving(Starving?) most of the prisoners to death. Mankind, being an inhering evil, is shown by the deaths of innocent people by...

Words: 585 - Pages: 3

Premium Essay

Elie Wiesel's Night Analysis

...Elie Wiesel’s memoir Night tells the story of the Holocaust, the mass genocide of the Jewish people and important event in WWII. The memoir Night begins in the polish town of Sighet. The story is About Elie Wiesel, a Jewish boy whose family gets deported to the concentration camp with other Jews from his town. Upon arrival his Mother and Sister, Tzipora are separated and executed by the Nazis in the Auschwitz death camp. Following that, after months of work, with the advancing allied front, the prisoners were forced to march all night to the Gleiwitz concentration camp. As Elie’s story continues, after being stuffed inside a camp barrack for 3 days without food or water, the Prisoners were let out for a selection, Elie’s Father was chosen to...

Words: 1665 - Pages: 7

Premium Essay

Change In Elie Wiesel's Night

...Eliezer’s Character Change The Holocaust was a devastating time in history where Jews were forced into concentration camps and worked, starved, or burned to death. One of the most influential writers who lived during this time period was Elie Wiesel. Wiesel’s Night is a memoir depicting the journey of a young boy, Eliezer, who experienced the Holocaust at a very young age. The Nazis occupied Hungary in the spring of 1944, and Eliezer and his family are deported to a concentration camp. While at several different concentration camps, Eliezer faces a variety of different situations, and he learns to adapt to his circumstances. As his father becomes weaker and weaker throughout the memoir, Elie starts to develop mixed emotions for him. During...

Words: 1498 - Pages: 6

Premium Essay

Night Elie Wiesel Night Analysis

...In reference to his experience during the Holocaust and why he wrote night, author Elie Wiesel says without the experience he would have not become "… A witness who believes he has a moral obligation to try to prevent the enemy from enjoying one last victory by allowing his crimes to be erased from human memory" (Wiesel ). The Holocaust is a memorable event that occurred in Germany and Eastern Europe in 1933 threw 1945. This tragedy was runned by Adolf Hitler and his Nazi party, killing a massive amount of Jews, homosexuals, Catholics, poles, and gypsies. Hitler strongly believed that the Jews were responsible for economic struggles also known as the great depression. Many people also believed they were to blame for the loss of war. In the...

Words: 1030 - Pages: 5

Premium Essay

Elie Wiesel's Response For Night

...assassinated? The historical background of Elie Wiesel, the author of Night, has experienced such a significant event. Wiesel is an Auschwitz survivor and his memoir, Night, reflects the society and the beliefs of its time. A controversy about this work is that some people believe the Holocaust never happened and as a result regard the book as false. However, this novel was important at the time it was written, because it was a time when people didn‘t believe in the Holocaust. In addition, Elie Wiesel’s background is essential to the Holocaust’s memory, because it deals with the Nazi’s genocide. The author of Night, who is also the protagonist of the book, shows how delusion and rumors spread false hopes and lies throughout the camp. The author also showed how Hitler’s belief that other races were inferior and didn’t deserve to live led to Hitler’ rise to power. Wiesel’s story is crucial to that time-period since it shows his perseverance through multiple concentration camps and the loss of close family members....

Words: 596 - Pages: 3

Premium Essay

Belief And Denial Of The Holocaust

...The Belief and Denial of the Holocaust Between 1933 and 1945, an event took place that would greatly affect the world forever. Jews, homosexuals, and even Jehovah’s Witnesses were stripped of their rights, mistreated continuously, and forced to complete hard manual labor. This horrendous event led by Adolf Hitler is known as the Holocaust. The Holocaust was an event in which “Jews were separated from their communities and persecuted; and finally they were treated as less than human beings and murdered” (What Was The Holocaust?). Adolf Hitler was the leader of Nazi Germany and the soldiers who were set out to annihilate anyone who did not follow social normalities. Even though there are various pictures and documents in existence showing proof...

Words: 1793 - Pages: 8

Premium Essay

Road Rage

...19 March 2012 Life during the Holocaust: Life in the ghettos, Dr. Mengele’s medical care, and food in the camps Genocide during WWII was unbelievably cruel and awful. The Holocaust was sure to be remembered from this time period and have permanently engraved horrible memories into those who survived. During the Holocaust many victims suffered while living in the ghettos, soon to reach the camps they also suffered there as well. The encounters with Dr. Mengele were unbearable too. Elie Wiesel’s memoir Night is very important especially the fact that it accurately describes what really happened during the Holocaust. One of these many reasons is that Wiesel was an actual survivor of the Holocaust. His descriptions of his experiences in the ghettos, encounters with Dr. Mengele and his trouble with small amounts of food in the camp greatly make us only able to imagine what he went through. Elie Wiesel in his memoir Night, along with other victims of the Holocaust was faced with many obstacles while living in the ghettos, encounters with Dr. Mengele and forced labor. Living in the ghettos was the first step in being dehumanized. Elie Wiesel describes these experiences in his memoir Night. One example of these experiences that were described by Elie was that decrees were to be made in the Jewish ghettos. “We were no longer allowed to go into restaurants or cafes, attend the synagogue and must be in at sic o’ clock.”(Wiesel 9). These are for the Jews in the ghettos prior to full...

Words: 1645 - Pages: 7

Premium Essay

Sophie Scholl the Final Days - Night. Comparative Essay

...In today’s day, we respect the past but rarely delve into it except for certain days. Elie Wiesel’s book Night is the self-account of Wiesel’s life in the Holocaust. It reflects back to the time through the eyes of a Jewish boy living in the awful conditions. It tells the story from the first few steps that Hitler takes, to when the camps was liberated. Wiesel delivered a powerful message "of peace, atonement and human dignity" to humanity. The Final Days is a film about resistance in Nazi Germany of one woman in particular. The movie starts off showing the main character having fun and there is light and laughter. This quickly changes as it shows her with members of the White Rose, an Anti-Nazi organization. She was caught and found guilty. This movie is a true story based on an actual Sophie Scholl who lived throughout this and was a member of the White Rose. Although one is about standing up for your rights not matter the consequence, and one is about knowing when hope is but a lost phrase, barely living in your mind. While that is all true, they also have a lot of differences, for instance, they have very different main characters who come from different parts and are effected by the war in different ways, each story is told in very different ways and each has its own meaning, and they have different messages that are portrayed throughout each. In the memoir Night, Elie starts off as a regular Jewish boy in Sighet, Transylvania. He was a teenager when his family...

Words: 956 - Pages: 4

Premium Essay

Elie Wiesel's Night Analysis

...Night by Elie Wiesel, recounts his experiences during the holocaust. Wiesel and his family were Jews living in Nazi Germany. He and his family were taken from their home in 1944 to the Auschwitz concentration camp. Elie was fifteen when he was imprisoned and his goal was to keep his family together. When the Germans separated Elie and his father from his mother and sister, he then focused on staying by his father’s side. As he and his father were being transported to Buna Werke, a concentration, the fear of being separated from his father was great, “all I [Elie] could think of was not to lose him [Elie’s father],” (Wiesel 30). Realizing that he would never see his mother and sister again, the idea of being alone without his father terrified him. Elie’s devotion to his father gave him a reason to...

Words: 670 - Pages: 3

Free Essay

Night Essay

...Wiesel’s Changes of Faith The Holocaust brought about many hardships and created severe adversity for its victims that may have created experiences ultimately too traumatic that transformed their lives for years to come, either through starvation and labor in the concentration camps or execution and incineration in the extermination camps. In the memoir Night by Elie Wiesel, Wiesel tells the story of himself as a young Jewish boy born in Romania, who in 1944, was forced into ghettos with the rest of the Jewish citizens and later deported, along with his father, to the Nazi’s largest killing center, Auschwitz-Birkenau. While living through this day-to-day horrifying basis, Elie begins to live with overwhelming fear and total alienation, as well as his increasing loss of faith on God and whether God is even existent or not for His lack of participation in trying to help the Jews. Although Elie manages to survive his long and frightening journey through both labor and death camps, his faith was never at the high-most air-reaching level as it dramatically changed throughout the course of the novel because of his disturbing experiences in witnessing cremated human beings, executions, and the going through the loss of his entire family. Prior to being deported to the camps, Elie’s faith was extremely high as he was well-established with his studies in mysticism and the cabbala and his great involvement with religion through prayers. Elie is finding a great interest in wanting to...

Words: 1428 - Pages: 6

Premium Essay

Elie Wiesel Night Acceptance Speech

...Can literature help us remember the past? Night, Perils of Indifference, and Acceptance Speech all have things in common. They can connect to different themes and they connect to one another. Literature has a big part in this world and it helps us remember past events, just like the Holocaust. In Elie Wiesel’s Acceptance Speech he says, “Who would allow such crime to be committed? How could the world remain silent?” This kinda ties back to theme 3 - breaking the silence on cruel acts is a way to break the cycle of repetition. He’s asking why would the world remain silent? He wanted people to break the silence when the crime was being committed. In this speech it also says “one person of integrity, can make a difference, a difference of life and death.” And this kinda connects to the prompt because it’s saying that you,...

Words: 640 - Pages: 3

Free Essay

The Holocaust

...RELIGION AND SOCIETY UNIT ONE * The Holocaust By Chelsea Nguyen 11 Silver QUESTION NUMBER 3: Discuss the relationship Wiesel has with God throughout Night. Eliezer Wiesel presents the Jewish faith in a moment of extreme darkness however, what gives him the courage and strength to continue to live is his connection with religion and his relationship with God. Initially Elie shows strong devotion, then becomes disillusioned with God’s power, and ultimately redefines the position God holds in his life. In the beginning, Elie Wiesel’s relationship with God in Night shows strong devotion. Wiesel made spirituality inherent to all activities, wished to spend his life focused around Judaism, and devoted all his free time and energy on religious studies. Wiesel believed that religion was a basic survival need, showing that he followed his religion instinctively. When asked why he prayed, Wiesel couldn’t think of a proper answer and thought, “…strange question, why did I live, why did I breathe?”. Wiesel maintained confidence in religion as the situation deteriorated. Wiesel and his people gave thanks to God for survival, keeping hope that God was putting them through a test of hardships what would keep them alive if they kept their faith. When they had arrived at Auschwitz, they thanked God and were able to regain their confidence because, “Here was a sudden release from the terrors of the previous nights”. Wiesel thanked God for the little things that helped him because...

Words: 882 - Pages: 4

Premium Essay

Night

...good luck trying to find it. Sayonara, au revoir, adios, bye. Elie Wiesel’s Night deals with his loss of faith in his God. Wiesel’s problem can be root all the way back to 1942, the beginning of Elie’s awakening, his first insight into the real world, his first insight into the Holocaust. The Holocaust was a horrid event, of ruthless killing, of senseless slaughter, destroying families, and a whirlwind of destruction. Under strain, ones happiness and ones faith is slowly whittled under the knife of opposition and pressure. Elie has lost so much through out his life, losing his family, his friends, but most importantly his faith. The first example of Elie loosing his faith is when he arrived at Auschwitz, Elie and his father are directed to go to the left; a prisoner then informs them that they are on their way to the crematory, Elie’s father recites the Kaddish or prayer for the dead, revolt rises up inside of Elie and he questions God, “Why should I bless His name? The Eternal, lord of the Universe, the All-Powerful and Terrible, was silent. What had I to thank Him for? (Wiesel 31)”. Elie is hopeless, his situation rendering him of his beliefs unable to believe that a holy being could cause such grief. He was stricken with terror that even after his prayers, his deep devotion to the great “lord” that God has thrust him into this “hell”. Another example of prisoners in the concentration camp loosing their faith in Night is when the Pipel, a young child, was hung in front of the...

Words: 779 - Pages: 4