brenticus reviewed Night by Élie Wiesel
Night is Elie Wiesel's masterpiece, a candid, horrific, and deeply poignant autobiographical account of his …
None
4 stars
I remember in grade 12 of high school we had the choice of what book to read for our final essay. Night was one of those options, and our teacher recommended it on account of it being really short. Naturally, most of the class decided short was good, while I went for Great Expectations, which was decidedly not. Something that was glossed over at the time was that this was an autobiographical account of the holocaust by Nobel Peace Prize winner. Maybe my superiority complex would have calmed down a bit if that had been the description rather than "it's short."
Regardless, I missed the chance for this to be my first holocaust biography and ended up reading Maus and By Chance Alone last year, both of which were phenomenal and eye-opening. Everyone with a pair of brain cells to rub together can recognize how horrifying the holocaust was, but the scope and length of it, along with the rampant anti-Semitism for years before and after, never seem to come up. And that's really what got me with those accounts; not only was there a group of people actively pushing these policies forward, but the whole of society seemed to accept it because they just didn't care for Jewish people.
While Night deserves all of its accolades as an emotional account of Wiesel's time during the last gasps of the holocaust, I think it would have had more impact had I read it when I had the option in high school. I think Spiegelman and Eisen capture the sheer scope and absurdity of anti-Semitism at the time much better, as the concentration camps weren't the entirety of what they wanted to talk about. No doubt, the camps are the most horrifying parts in all of these books, but Wiesel's account focuses almost solely on his experience getting to and suffering in the camps.
When I read Eisen's account, I was shocked by how his freedom simply brought more and more hardships, with no real support for these people who had been through so much. When I read Spiegelman's account, I was shocked by the conditions they were forced to live in for ages before even reaching the camps.
Night didn't reveal anything new to me, exactly, but it was a beautifully written, emotional account that gets into the struggles Jewish people had with their faith and humanity during the holocaust. And, like my teacher said, it's short; it requires basically no time to read, and if you've never gotten a first-hand account of the horrors of the holocaust it's a very good way to dive into exactly why we can't forget this or let it happen again.
Regardless, I missed the chance for this to be my first holocaust biography and ended up reading Maus and By Chance Alone last year, both of which were phenomenal and eye-opening. Everyone with a pair of brain cells to rub together can recognize how horrifying the holocaust was, but the scope and length of it, along with the rampant anti-Semitism for years before and after, never seem to come up. And that's really what got me with those accounts; not only was there a group of people actively pushing these policies forward, but the whole of society seemed to accept it because they just didn't care for Jewish people.
While Night deserves all of its accolades as an emotional account of Wiesel's time during the last gasps of the holocaust, I think it would have had more impact had I read it when I had the option in high school. I think Spiegelman and Eisen capture the sheer scope and absurdity of anti-Semitism at the time much better, as the concentration camps weren't the entirety of what they wanted to talk about. No doubt, the camps are the most horrifying parts in all of these books, but Wiesel's account focuses almost solely on his experience getting to and suffering in the camps.
When I read Eisen's account, I was shocked by how his freedom simply brought more and more hardships, with no real support for these people who had been through so much. When I read Spiegelman's account, I was shocked by the conditions they were forced to live in for ages before even reaching the camps.
Night didn't reveal anything new to me, exactly, but it was a beautifully written, emotional account that gets into the struggles Jewish people had with their faith and humanity during the holocaust. And, like my teacher said, it's short; it requires basically no time to read, and if you've never gotten a first-hand account of the horrors of the holocaust it's a very good way to dive into exactly why we can't forget this or let it happen again.