uncleanjoe 's review for:

Night by Elie Wiesel

4.5

challenging dark emotional sad medium-paced

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 Night is a powerful and emotionally devastating account of the experiences of a Holocaust survivor, inspired by Wiesel's own time at Auschwitz and Buchenwald. This is a book of despair, of pain, of death, and of shame. One particularity painful moment, in a book of full of such moments, is when Eliezer feels a moment of freedom after the death of his father in Buchenwald. Previously, while being transported to Buchenwald, Eliezer witnessed a father and son brutally attack each other over a scrap of bread, and prays he never will forsake his father this way. This showcases how the Holocaust did not only strip victims of their lives, but perhaps even crueler, of their humanity as well. I found it surprising that Wiesel had little to say about the Germans as a whole in this novel, as it seems the majority of his hate and anger is focused on a God that could allow this to happen. Elie Wiesel's Night is a survivor's account, full of grief, guilt, and shame, and it stands as a monumental testament against the brutality of Fascism and genocide.