Heckethorn 1

Melanie Heckethorn
English I
Literary Analysis Essay- Final Draft
November 18, 2016
Never Forget
Never shall I forget that night (Wiesel 34). Night, by Elie Wiesel is an autobiography
of his life while spent in the concentration camps during World War II. As a child he is taken
from his exploration of his faith as a Jew, and forced into horrific camps. In these camps he is
forced to lie about his age on the very first day; suddenly becoming an eighteen-year-old. His
journey through the camps of Auschwitz, Birkenau, Buna, Buchenwald, and others is riddled
with his loss of faith and identity, his need to stay with his father, and his sheer will to survive.
Although Wiesel illustrates multiple themes throughout his novel, one of the most prominent of
these themes is Elies loss of innocence in those long eleven months of imprisonment.
One of the most important times in which Wiesel illustrates Elies loss of innocence is
the moment when Elie witnesses the live babies and children being thrown into the crematorium
fires. Babies! Yes, I did see this, with my own eyes children thrown into the flames Was I
still alive? Was I awake? How was it possible that men, women, and children were being burned
and that the world kept silent? (32). Wiesel uses rhetorical questions to illustrate how confused
young Elie is. He is questioning his own sanity. Each question mirrors his rising anger at the
people in the world. He is unable to fathom the horrors that he is witnessing when he first
entered the camp and he cannot believe that these things are happening and no one in the world
is doing anything to stop it. Elie went from being a young boy yearning to learn about his

Commented [1]: Outstanding introduction!!!

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religion to watching babies being burned alive. His childhood innocence was ebbing away one
day at a time.
Another instance that represents Elies loss of innocence is when he must watch his father
get slapped and stand there and do absolutely nothing. What had happened to me? My father
had just been struck, in front of me, and I had not even blinked. [] Only yesterday, I would
have dug my nails into this criminals flesh. Had I changed that much? (39). Elie says right then
and there that only yesterday he would have fought back for his father. His young, innocent self
wouldnt have been able to restrain himself from his protective instincts for his father. He
questions himself on how much he could have changed in that short amount of time. From just
being in the camp for two days he has grown up enough to know that if he had fought back, they
would have killed him right there. He had to mature mentally in an extremely short amount of
time.
After those first days Elie became a different person and slowly his only thoughts were
staying with his father and the soup; to survive and to eat. But, his father becomes sick and
becomes somewhat of a burden to Elie. When his father dies of Dysentery on January 29, 1945
he does not cry; is not able to cry. I was out of tears. And deep inside me, if I could have
searched the recesses of my feeble conscience, I might have found something like: Free at last!
(112). Elie is a sixteen-year-old boy who cannot cry over his dead father. The horrors of those
camps have stolen his tears from him and he is unable to cry. This boy went from having his
father as his only tie to wanting to live to feeling free when he dies.
Although Elie felt free at last, Wiesel does not describe his time in the camp from
January to April. Since my fathers death, nothing mattered to me anymore. [...] I spent my days
in total idleness. With only one desire: to eat. I no longer thought of my father, or my mother

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(113). Elie is now almost an emotionless corpse. He is no longer the child who begged his father
to learn about the Kabbalah and cried when he prayed (4). He is a teenager, a boy, whose only
thoughts are about his next meal; about how hell survive until the next day. Those eleven
months spent in the concentration camps completely altered him. He was forced to grow up very
quickly both mentally and physically, just to survive through it all. By the end of the novel,
Wiesel illustrates just how different Elie is.
Elie survived through the tortures of the concentration camp at the age of fifteen and
sixteen and somehow made it out stronger than he was before. From the beatings, to the hunger,
to the other mental and physical tortures that he endured at that young age, he made it through it
all to tell his story. Wiesel accomplished his goal to inform the public about what it was like in
those concentration camps. Through the use of incredible imagery, descriptions, and the utterly
horrifying but awe inspiring facts, he impacts each and every person who reads this novel.
Wiesels rollercoaster life of loss of innocence, identity, and faith coupled with the loss of his
whole family is really impactful. To endure all those horrors and then bounce back to write this
novel gives everyone hope. It reminds the world about a time in history that should never be
repeated while also giving people hope that oneyou can survive through anything.

Commented [2]: :) I had to make at least ONE

correction.
Commented [3]: Unintelligible sobbing and gooey
remarks. Your hamburger paragraphs are beautiful and
exceptional, and your conclusion is insightful and
superb. Nice work.

Heckethorn 4
Works Cited
Wiesel, Elie. Night. Translated by Marion Wiesel, Hill And Wang: New York, 2006. Print.

Wright 1
Carson Wright
English I
Literary Analysis Essay
18 November 2016
Unforgettable
Civilized men can be turned into beasts if they have to endure terrible circumstances. Elie
Wiesel and his father were put into labor camps during the holocaust. They were faced with hard
work, terrible living conditions, and little food. They were also torn from the rest of their family
who were most likely killed shortly after their separation. In Elie Wiesels book Night, he tells
the story of his time in the labor camps and the things that went on around him during this time.
When these men in these camps were faced with survival or death, most of them chose survival
at any means necessary.
One example of surviving by any means necessary is when some mens sons left them
behind so they didn't have to carry the weight of both themselves and their fathers. During one
move to another camp, Rabbi Eliahus son deserted him in order to make survival easier for
himself. In the book as Elie is thinking about this, he remembers his son had seen him losing
ground, sliding back to the rear of the column. He had seen him. And he had continued to run in
front, letting the distance between them become greater (Wiesel 91).
Another instance where survival controls how these men reacted during this time is when
Elie's father angered one of the guards and was being beaten. Elie realizes he was angry at his
father for what he had done, but, at that time, he was not mad at the guard. I had watched it all
happening without moving. I kept silent. In fact, I thought of stealing away in order not to suffer

Commented [1]: Great start to a hamburger

paragraph, but we're missing the meat after your quote.
You allude to it in your set up, which is GREAT! but I
want more now that you've given the quote. How did
this quote just show how someone is choosing to
survive using any means necessary? SPELL it out for
me! That's analysis.

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the blows. Whats more, if I felt anger at that moment, it was not directed at the kapo but at my
father. Why couldn't he have avoided Ideks wrath? (54).
The guards and kapos werent part of the German army to begin with. They were
prisoners of war that had been appointed to these positions, and they took them very seriously
and used all the power they had to keep themselves alive. There were times when Jews had been
appointed to these positions. They turned on the others and used their power to take advantage of
the resources and take whatever they needed from the lower class.
In conclusion, the men in this situation went into complete survival mode and did almost
anything to survive. Some of them even turned on each other and left family behind. Some were

Commented [2]: Same thing! We need the rest of your

hamburger. You have SUCH a great start! You connect
to your thesis in your top bun, you set up your quote,
and then quote it (correctly in MLA!), and then you
leave the reader to make the analysis in our heads! I
KNOW what your analysis is because you set it up so
nicely, but you DIDN'T WRITE IT! :) It needs to follow
your quote. I need your hamburger.
Commented [3]: Need better transition. Your others
were much better - connecting to thesis while moving
on...
Commented [4]: Need quote. Even if not directly. If
you are referencing times when the Kapos turned on
others, cite the page! You don't have to quote verbatim,
but you must reference the page or pages in a citation.
Because you don't have a specific instance or
instances pointed out, there really isn't much analysis
in this paragraph either. :(

given power in the camps, and they turned and beat other people and did not help them in any
way. Ellie kept some mentality and resisted from some of the things they did. He did however
lose his sympathy for others and his innocence.

Commented [5]: Great start to your conclusion. You've

recapped your thesis and your main points. Now we
need the "so what" final thought. Is there something we
should learn from this? Or is there a closing, sad
reminder that even the best of us fail under extreme
circumstances? or... ? We need that final tackle.

Wright 3
Work Cited
Wiesel, Elie. Night. Translated by Marion Wiesel, Hill and Wang: New York, 2006. Print.