Night, by Elie Wiesel is an autobiography including the main characters Elie,
his family, and all the victims of the holocaust. The main idea of this book is
to get people to realize the pain and suffering of the Jewish people during the
Holocaust. Because of cruel incidents, people’s emotions go numb. They had no
lives. The Jewish prisoners went to any length to stay alive; lying, killing,
and even betraying family. Jewish prisoners knew nothing about how to survive
the deadly camp of Auschwitz. Most Jewish prisoners were thrown into ditches to
burn if not the right age or if they looked too weak to work. Elie and his
father lied about their ages to pass the first selection. By lying about their
ages, they were viewed as more fit to work. The prisoners actually came to
realize “Work is liberty” at Auschwitz. Lying became common among the Jews
to pass selections. Rations of food were scarce, thus killing for crumbs were
occurrences that happened daily. For instance, a son fought his father for
bread. “Meir. Meir, my boy! Don’t you recognize me? I’m your father...
you’re hurting me...you’re killing your father! I’ve got some bread...for
you too...for you too....” This shows how the Holocaust made people genocidal.
Feelings left their souls on the first day at camp, for when someone died no one
cared. Family betraying family took place during marches to new camps. A boy and
his father had to run as fast as they could for as long as possible until the
S.S. soldiers said they could stop. The penalty would be death if a prisoner
decided to slow down. A boy realized his father was weak and starting to slow
down with him and instead of slowing down with him, the boy decided to run
faster and leave his father for dead, for his own protection. Could you even
imagine what the Holocaust would be like in todays world? After thinking about
actions that took place during this time period, could there be another
Holocaust? No one really knows what could happen. Aren’t their events that
take place in racism crimes today around the world that makes us think there
could be a Holocaust two? Lets hope that our society doesn’t corrupt bad
enough for it to happen again but, only time can tell.