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Elie Wiesel's Night

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Use details from the text to explain how human beings respond to life in a concentration camp. How do their attitudes, personalities, and behaviors change over time?

Broken Souls The human eye is considered by many to be the pathway to the soul. When looking into another person’s eyes far more can be seen than just the retina. The feelings, emotions, and experiences can all be seen through the eyes if viewed the right way. For many people, a life of joy and happiness may be seen, but unfortunately for even more people, a life of sorrow and despair can be seen all too easily. In Elie Wiesel’s Night, lives filled with sorrow, despair, and darkness seem to surround Elie, and swallow him up in the process. The people placed in …show more content…
They instilled fear upon everyone inside the concentration camps, they burned children, mothers, and the elderly alive. They even did this in front of the able-bodied workers to break them in some sense. This was done knowing how it would affect them as people, not as Jews, not as Gypsies, but as people. It truly destroyed these people watching their loved ones and others be exterminated right in front of them. The most powerful and unforgettable piece of the book is what Elie says and how he is affected after the first night in Birkenau. “Never shall I forget the small faces of the children whose bodies I saw transformed into smoke under a silent sky. Never shall I forget those flames that consumed my faith forever. Never shall I forget the nocturnal silence that deprived me for all eternity of the desire to live.” This is powerful beyond comprehension, only those who saw what Elie saw will ever understand what it is like to die before you are really dead. His entire person changes after this night. He no longer believes in God, his faith perished along with every other poor soul whose lives were taken from them, and all for nothing. Elie’s attitude, personality, and behavior are now all completely altered. He has died inside, and the only thing left for him at this point was his father besides him. However even still caring and loving his father came back to hurt him even deeper. After

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