A Night of Human Tragedy: The Holocaust Essay Example

Simon Wiesenthal quotes, “The Holocaust was not only a Jewish tragedy, but a human tragedy.” Night is a true story written by a Holocaust survivor, although it is not a nonfiction or fiction genre; it is classified as a personal narrative, memoir, and an autobiography. In the book Night, Elie Wiesel, tells the story of what life was like in concentration camps. He experienced the worst of the worst, from the point of going through death runs/marches to watching his father die on his deathbed at Buchenwald.

Being put through tough circumstances, he disrespected his religion and turned against it at one point because of the mental horror Elie was put through. He and his father were put through a death march to another camp (Buchenwald) through an icy snow storm and finally arrived; eventually American troops arrived, taking authority of the camp and rescuing all survivors. Elie Wiesel was one of those survivors. Elie Wiesel wrote a nonfiction novel about historical events that he went through, which includes arrivals at Auschwitz Concentration Camp, an Air Raid at Buna in 1943, and burying Jewish corpses.

During the book, Night, Elie Wiesel is put in the concentration camp, Auschwitz. When Elie Wiesel went through his first arrival at a concentration camp, he described the preparation he went through in order to become a prisoner. After researching, an interview from Cecilie Klein-Pollack, she described the arrival at Auschwitz. From the interview, she quotes, “They Marched us to a large building, we were told to undress…. This Kapo flings it to the side.. She says I won’t need it anymore… I was terribly scared because I did not know what it meant. They shaved our hair… We couldn’t even recognize each other, once we were stripped.”(United States Holocaust Memorial Museum). All Kapo’s, SS officers, and the guards take away all hope and brought fear to the table. 

The importance of this quote shows that there is no mercy during arrivals and preparation (and the full time that the prisoners were there) were just to prepare them for the worst to come. Elie Wiesel made that clear in the novel because the events that he experienced, explained that the circumstances got worse after arrivals. These descriptions from real survivors bring a better understanding about the feelings of the prisoners; truly describing how they feel in the situations. From the second interview, Hana Mueller Bruml quotes, “Everybody looks like a monkey.”(United States Holocaust Memorial Museum). The meaning in this quote produces a true feeling behind this event. It made Elie’s descriptions in arrival really stand out. Explaining that the Germans take away their identity and as if it “cleansed” them of their religion and themselves. 

While reading the book, a nonfictional event happened at Buna (concentration camp), which ended up being a non-effective bombing. There was something different about this bombing; the country behind it missed and caused no damage, except killing one prisoner. What was confusing is that many countries, including the U.S. Air Force, used satellite images of the concentration camps to have an easier accuracy of bombing the camp. In the book, it became questionable if the attackers used satellites. The website quoted one survivor from the Holocaust; they quoted, “We were no longer afraid of death; at any rate not of that death. Every bomb that exploded filled us with joy and gave us new confidence in life.”(United States Holocaust Memorial Museum).  In the novel, Elie wrote about a bombing, all the prisoners had hope and that one day hope would bring them closer to freedom. After, being put through circumstances that are unimaginable, bombings did not bring a thought of fear to their minds. Researching this event, proves that air raids or bombings don’t have to be effective, but it tells prisoners that one day, someone will give them freedom.

Reading through Night, there was not much material covering the information about burying the corpses of innocent Jews. The book informed the reader that the SS officers buried all bodies in a mass grave. Sometimes it was required to hire slave laborers to complete the job. It was possible that the job was too much for those people to all because there were so many bodies. Information quoted below a picture says, “...eventually the British had to resort to bulldozers to push the thousands of bodies into mass graves.”(United States Holocaust Memorial Museum).

The Nazi’s killed so many Jews, that it almost became impossible to bury them all. Many people get the job done was not always enough, and researching the topic of course burial was heavy information. In terms that so many dead bodies were buried with bulldozers under the ground that some people might be walking on. The image information quoted, “...prisoners of other camps who were too sick to work were brought, though none received medical treatment… These prisoners were eventually buried in the mass graves.”(United States Holocaust Memorial Museum). Research proved that cruelness was at its finest during the Holocaust. Medical treatment was not an option for people who were innocent and didn’t get the treatment deserved. 

In the novel, Night, Elie Wiesel wrote about events that will forever mark our history that took place at concentration camps. The Holocaust scarred every person involved and will be remembered by all because it marked the level of cruelness that humans did to one another. The Jewish prisoners went through an arrival and preparation at concentration camps, and at Auschwitz they begin to prepare you for the worst. When another country attempted to bomb a concentration camp, they used satellite imagery, and Buna was a camp that once had an ineffective bombing. At the end of a prisoner’s time at camp, it usually ended in death and all were buried in a mass grave. Hope was sucked from all people during the devastating time. Even though it was a tragedy for all Jews, it will be an event people remember that contains meer hope.