Night, by Elie Wiesel, traces Elie's
own experiences of life as a young Jew during the Second World War (WWII), sent with his
father to the concentration camps. He would never see his mother and siblings
again.
In describing Wiesel's experiences, it would be
difficult to describe the fear, the uncertainty, the hate and the disbelief through the
use of factual language as mere words could never describe the suffering. Images need to
be created in the mind's eye so that the reader can become engrossed in the reality and
can believe what actually happened. Without using metaphors, simile, personification,
rhetorical questions and irony, the story would be one of graphic abuse and torture;
something that would possibly preclude some people and dissuade others from reading it.
here are just a few examples.
Towards the end of
Night, the images that are created are stark reminders of how even
simple things can have enormous significance and the reader is aware that nothing should
ever be taken for granted. For Elie and his weakening father, they have been reduced to
something almost, "like a wild beast" and Elie's father is
recognizable more as "a wounded animal," than his own dear
father as he gracefully accepts Elie's offer of a sip of coffee.
Even in the midst of terror, Elie feels guilty
for his own desire to survive. He tells the reader that, "My heart was
heavy," because, although he is sharing his soup with his sick father, he
is doing so "grudgingly." His father has been denied food because, as a person close to
death, it would apparently be nothing more than "a waste of food" to give him his own
ration. The irony of Elie's own statement, of his own sense of guilt which he feels on
various occasions, sometimes wishing to be free of his responsibilities, is intensified
by the cruelty by which he is surrounded but he is the one feeling ashamed and his
captors feel nothing.
Elie describes his father as he
continues to get weaker with his, "Face the color of dead
leaves," and being so ill that, "He went by me like a
shadow." The reader has no doubt that his father is fading away, this
metaphor and simile confirming how Elie's father barely exists. It is ironic as he is
treated as if he has already died by not receiving food rations.
As the war comes to an end, "The wheel of
history turned." It is possible that Wiesel is comparing this "wheel" to
the wheel of fortune. Just as the wheel of fortune is a game of chance so too, when the
war ends, the fate of the Jews is still uncertain. "Fortune" can also mean "fate" and so
Wiesel's suggestion that things are about to change - history- is a good thing but the
scars run so deep that, for some there will be no respite and, of course, for others, it
is too late anyway.
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