The Poisionwood Bible and Night Comparison/Contrast Essay.
The two books, Night and The Poisonwood Bible, carry the same general theme: change. .
In both stories, the author's primary goal is to obviously display how each situation would effect .
the lives of those involved forever. Wiesel and Kingsolver do amazing jobs of almost physically .
placing the reader into the situations by simply explaining the change that took place in the .
hearts and minds of their characters. Night and The Poisonwood Bible are similar based on their .
illustrations of change and the effects of the change, and differ in how the change motivates .
them.
Elie Wiesel, author of Night, uses his book as a means to provide, as vividly as he knows .
how, an account of the change his life faced as a fifteen-year-old boy. The book begins with him .
at home with his family solely as a point of comparison for the reader. Its only real purpose is .
achieved by the time the reader reaches the end of the story and has an opportunity to reflect on .
the complete transformation Wiesel underwent in only a year's time.
Kingsolver sets up for this effect differently. Compared to Night, where the reader sees .
the changes take place physically, The Poisonwood Bible portrays change mentally. While .
2.
reading, a progression is seen in the minds of the four girls in the Congo. They start out as .
teenage girls but by the end of the book, their experiences have completely altered their life and .
way of looking at it. The reader can easily notice this by the set of ideals every girl has at the .
end, compared to the beginning. Instead of explaining their life prior to the Congo, Kingsolver .
leaves that up to the reader, but continues the story well into girls" future to enable the reader to .
observe the long-term changes.
Another change both books reveal is a change of heart. Wiesel best exemplifies this .
when he says, "Never shall I forget those flames which consumed my faith forever," (Wiesel 32).
