night-novel by wiesel

“My father was a cultured, rather unsentimental man. There was never any display of emotion, even at home. He was more concerned with others than with his own family.”(2)

It was when they became separated from the rest of their family that they started to depend on each other. Paramount on their minds was to stay together because all they had left was each other. Eliezer cared greatly for his father but the concentration camp started to harden his soul. The first instance of this was when at Auschwitz.

“…he dealt my father such a clout that he fell to the ground, crawling back to his place on all fours. I did not move. What had happened to me? My father had just been struck, before my very eyes, and I had not flickered an eyelid.”(37)

Eliezer had changed suddenly. He regretted that he did nothing to help. There was nothing he could’ve done without severe consequences.

The life in concentration camps corrupted the mind. There was one day when Eliezer’s father was recei

"My father’s presence was the only thing that stopped me…He was running at my side, out of breath, at the end of his strength, at his wit’s end. I had no right to let myself die. What would he do without me? I was his only support" (82).

ving a beating. Eliezer blamed his father for it “ I was angry with him, for not knowing how to avoid Idek’s outbreak.”(52) He had become less compassionate for his father and his mistakes. He showed he still was concerned of his father’s well being after the incident with Idek. Eliezer taught his father how to march in pace because he was being beaten. The first selection brought about a realization of their worse fear, being separated. Eliezer’s father had been ordered to stay behind for the second selection and it looked like the end for him. He was terrified his father would be put to death. He had to go off to work wondering if he would return to camp an orphan or if his father would be alive. He was relieved when he returned and found his father had not been chosen for the furnace.

Another instance of father and son turmoil is the train ride to Buchenwald. People threw pieces of bread inside the train to see the prisoners fight for the food. At the time of the fight an old man comes across a piece of bread and sneaks away from the mob of people. The man does not go unnoticed. Someone pounced on top of the old man and began beating him for the bread. At some stage in the skirmish

Some topics in this essay:
, Meir Meir, Gleiwitz Eliezer, Rabbi Eliahou, Idek Eliezer, Buchenwald People, concentration camp, forward father, father son, eliezer realized, eliezer’s father,