Night by elie wiesel success and failure about his life and his book

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The Night by Elie Wiesel
Elie Wiesel was a Jew from Hungary born in 1928, who was not affected by the ranging mass killings of the Jews in Europe until 1944. During his younger years, he studied the traditional Jewish texts. During the war, he and his family were captured by the Germans and taken to a concentration camp, Auschwitz. His family was murdered in the Holocaust. Elie was a survivor, and after that, he left to France. In France, he studied philosophy, psychology, and literature and later became a journalist. He was so reluctant about sharing his experiences of the Holocaust. He, however, was convinced by a Catholic writer to express his traumatic memories (Horn, Pierre L. et al. 47). He writes the book, Night, to dispose of his emotional turmoil during the Holocaust. He later relocated to the United States and continued with his career. His life experiences made him become a humanitarian and a political activist. His expression on the “global crisis of humanity” made him a Nobel Peace Prize winner in 1986.
He engaged in teaching, and most of his students belonged to the Holocaust survivors. He made it his mission to promote peace and understanding between conflicting groups by creating the Elie Wiesel Foundation for Humanity in 1986. His aim was also to combat injustice and intolerance. He helped in the creation of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. He acquired 90 honorary degrees during his lifetime.

Wiesel was also awarded the Media of Freedom in the year 1992 (Horn, Pierre L. et al. 68). Elie Wiesel is a symbol of transformation. His vision for the establishment of the museum transformed millions of people by helping them remember the loss of the innocent lives. He gave a voice to the victims who survived wars. His expressions in the book reflect that he had his humanity and was pitiful to those who suffered with him. He values the relationship of family. He shares of his close relationship with his father which was stripped off by the Nazis. He felt guilty and hopeless when he wouldn’t take care of his father in the concentration camp.
The events of the Holocaust made Wiesel question the existence of God. He was among the first people who ever questioned the existence of God. He wondered where God was when all the suffering occurred. The Germans annihilated six million Jews during the Holocaust. He, therefore, seeks to have a clear understanding of faith. Initially, Wiesel was a staunch Jew but later questioned his beliefs of faith. He allowed the cruelty and selfishness of the worldly people detach him from his faith. On arrival at the camp, he was separated from his sister and his mother. He watched his father succumb to an illness and guiltily admitted that the death of his father made him happy (Wiesel, Elie and Marion Wiesel 102). He succumbed to being a doubtful man who was driven by his pursuit of endless questions. In his questioning of God’s existence, he states that if God’s own created the world is so cruel and selfish, then God himself ought to be cruel and selfish or be a non-existent spirit. Eliezer would have over emphasized to his father on why they would have moved. He let his father’s ignorance that the Germans would never defeat Russians cloud him. He would have managed to save his family before the German’s intrusion to Hungary. Eliezer fails his father in the concentration camp. He, like most people, fail to rise against the Nazi rulers. He watched while his father was tortured and later killed. He did not defend his father. He let fear cloud his mind, therefore, leading to his father’s death. Critics state that Wiesel began his foundation and accepted the position in the museum as leverage to earn him the Nobel Peace Prize and not for utmost good faith. Wiesel did not believe in himself. He states that if the world was capable of so much evil, he was also capable of executing evils to humanity.
Most publishers were reluctant about publishing the book because they thought the world would never be interested in the pessimism expressed. However, some publishers took and chance on it, and it became a memoir. It became a memoir that bore knowledge on the Holocaust. His book gave a chance to the publishing of related stories of the Holocaust. Approximately 60 more books were published. His book, Night, explains his experiences during the Holocaust. He, however, uses a character named Eliezer to represent himself in the book. He describes the events from a personal level and with brutal honesty. A great descriptive information about the characters in the novel helps one connect with the characters throughout the novel.
The novel also gives a highlight of the events of the Second World War. It would, therefore, be used as a reference in the future to source for the major historical event. Wiesel being Jewish does not make him lie about the Jews being ignorant of what was happening around them. It, therefore, displays the attribute of honesty. The Hungary Jews saw the signs of war but ignored them. They thought that the German camps were just a rumor (Wiesel, Elie and Marion Wiesel 34). It was voted as a memoir to help celebrate the dead. The success of his book contributed to Wiesel being a part of the creation of the Museum. His book does reveal not only the facts of the Holocaust but also a brief description of the life before the Holocaust. Wiesel’s strategy of organizing his novel made it a success because the comparison of both periods shows the magnitude of the Holocaust. The Night does not only revolve around Eliezer but includes other characters. The use of different personalities gives the reader a chance to understand the broader picture of the story. Opinions of the minor characters would also help in understanding the story of various perspectives. He reveals the brutality of the Germans which helps the reader understand the dictatorship leader, Adolf Hitler.
Details expressed about the boy, Eliezer, are different from Wiesel’s real-life. Wiesel failed his book by combing the aspects of Christianity and that of the Jewish suffering. His texts were universalized. There were high chances that Wiesel edited his original texts to please the now- Jewish people who were his audience. It would lead to alteration of the original picture. His original Yiddish version bore a lot of aspects of vengeance against the Germans. He stated that after the Holocaust, the young men who survived were going to Weimar to rape the German girls. His statement is, however, not captured in the later English and French versions. It is, therefore, evident that some aspects of his text are updated. However, he defended himself and claimed that his thoughts were changed in between the versions. It was not worth to reduce such a historical event to a simple vengeance. After he lost his parents in the Holocaust, he never mentions about them again in the rest of the book. Wiesel does not only concentrate on documenting the historical truths about the Holocaust but also on the emotional truth. He gives his readers an opportunity to interact with his emotion to get a true picture of the events.
Wiesel is so blatant by the way he expresses God in his texts. He fails to consider the reaction of his audience who are staunch Christians. He concludes that God’s silence during the mass killings reflects his lack of divine of compassion. Critics claim that there lacks enough evidence to pin Wiesel as a Holocaust survivor. There were registries in the concentration camps and New York Times reported that Wiesel’s details were non- existent. The only proof shown is an image exhibited in the Museum showing his face in detention. Some people also claim that in comparison to another web- sourced images, the image may also be non- existent. The theories make the story seem fictitious and a lie to the whole world. The vivid details like burning of people and hanging of children make it unsuitable for the younger generation. Wiesel explains about all his near death experiences which make him lose faith in God. On the contrary, Wiesel’s faith in God should have increased because out of the six million Jews who lost their lives; he emerged a survivor. His doubt in God reflects his ungratefulness for being a survivor.
Works Cited
Horn, Pierre L. et al. “Conversations With Elie Wiesel”. World Literature Today, vol 76, no. 3/4, 2002, p. 101. JSTOR, doi:10.2307/40157645.
Wiesel, Elie and Marion Wiesel. Night. 1st ed., New York, NY, Hill And Wang, A Division Of Farrar, Straus And Giroux, 2006,.