Justin Velarde

IB English HL

Wolfe Period 4

24 May, 2018

Scholarship

Withstanding Evil

The Holocaust brought pain and death to Jewish families all around Europe. In

the book, ​Night​, Elie Wiesel was a teenager during the war that experienced Hitler’s

wrath first-hand and was put face to face with pure evil. In the concentration camps Elie

learned to survive in the face of pure evil. This coneys the idea that human beings can

survive anything because of their will to live.

In the beginning of the book, the German people led the Jewish people to believe

that they had nothing to worry about. The Germans in Sighet “[were] distant but polite”

(9). This shows that the Nazis’ deceptively evil nature.They did this so that the Jewish

people of the town were as little prepared as possible. Even though the “Fascists were

already in power” (10) the Jewish people were unaware of their impending doom. The

decent thing to do would have been to provide the Jewish people a warning so that they

could save their most valuable belongings. Instead the German officers left the people

blissfully unaware so that they could take everything that they fancied. However, the

events that followed made these inhuman actions seem mundane when put into

perspective.
 As soon as Elie reached Auschwitz it became apparent that he had reached hell

on earth. On a regular basis, Elie was put “face-to-face with the Angel of Death” (34).

No person of Elie’s age should ever have to endure so much death and pain. But Elie’s

will to live gave him the strength to push through the darkest of times. Later, when Elie’s

father could not march properly the other “inmates made fun of [him]” (55). One of the

understated inhumanities of the Nazis was their ability to turn good people into bullies.

Elie’s father would not had to endure this if it weren’t for the Nazis’s ability to bring out

the absolute worst in people. With that being said the Nazis later on proved they were

capable of such evil things that puts in question if they were actual people.

Towards the end of Elie’s experiences in the Holocaust the Nazis sunk to a new

low and found a way to be eviler than ever. As Elie and his fellow prisoners ran to their

next prison,but there was a catch. They could not stop for any reason because they

would have been “eliminated [like a] filthy dog” (85). However, Elie found the willpower

to run for his life even when the Nazis cowardly allowed themselves to take breaks

whenever they felt a little tired. The Nazis were essentially giving the Jewish people a

death sentence seeing that they forced them to run a long distance when they were

weak, under-nourished, and it was freezing cold. Finally, when death was on the verge

of taking Elie’s father the Nazis treated him just as ruthlessly as ever. As the German

officer dealt Elie’s father “a violent blow to the head” (111) did not take into account that

Elie’s father was sick and on the verge of death. Doing this to him was an unnecessary

evil that proves the appalling nature of the Nazis. This particular officer did not show any

level of respect to a man in the last moments of his life.

 Elie Wiesel’s ability to withstand the most terrible ordeal in human history is

rather extraordinary. Even after losing his faith, and the ones he loved, Elie miraculously

found a way to keep moving forward. His will to live is a testament to those countless

people that had to survive this awful war. Elie Wiesel is proof that human beings have

the ability to survive their darkest hours and come out stronger than ever.

Withstanding Evil (Revised)

Elie Wiesel's ​Night​, tells his experience as a teenager forced to survive through

the genocide of the Holocaust. In the concentration camps, Wiesel experiences more

loss than most people would face in a lifetime and is constantly victim to senseless

cruelty. Despite this, Wiesel and the other prisoners are able to survive and maintain

their humanity. These two ideas contribute to the overall theme that people can find

ways to survive through the most abhorrent acts of evil.

Wiesel characterizes the deceptive evil nature of the nazis in the early stages of

the book. They often presented themselves as “distant but polite” (9) in order to disarm

the caution of the locals and hide their true intentions of societal domination. Wiesel

includes this in order to provide an explanation as to how the Nazis rose and that their

aims within Europe were originally unknown. Without anybody knowing, the “Fascists

were already in power” (10) the Jewish people were helpless to prevent their impending

doom. As a result, the nazis began taking over community after community in Europe

without warning and people faced the unfathomable evil of being stripped away from

their loved ones and live. The deception that Wiesel conveys points to a complete lack
of empathy that is able to take hold and ultimately reveals a new depth of the evil that

humans are capable of.

The extent of the villainy of the Holocaust is truly revealed when Wiesel reaches

Auschwitz. On a regular basis, Elie was put “face-to-face with the Angel of Death” (34)

when he was separated from his family and had his humanity belittled by the Nazis .

Later, when Elie’s father could not march properly the other “inmates made fun of [him]”

(55). This points to a tendency for cruelty to spread to other people in times of extreme

stress. The commonality through these acts is Wiesel’s to persevere at a young age

without the support of the family. Wiesel tells a story of survival that was consistent with

that of millions of other Jewish people that had their lives stripped away and were forced

to cope with the unquestionable villainy of the Nazi Death Camps. In some ways,

Wiesel tells a story that is as much about the resiliency of the human spirit as it is about

the extent of the evil that lies within each human being.

The implementation of Hitler’s final solution to kill everybody in the concentration

camp introduced a new degree of wickedness that Wiesel and other prisoners were

forced to cope with. Wiesel and the other prisoners were forced to march through the

harsh Polish winter in an extremely malnourished and unprepared condition. If they

stopped they would be “eliminated [like] filthy dogs” (85). Wisel includes this to allude to

the ability of the human spirit to survive through physical failure and to show the

conditions that they were faced with. Wiesel’s greatest trial came when he was forced to

cope with the death of his father. As the German officer dealt Elie’s father “a violent

blow to the head” (111) did not take into account that Elie’s father was sick and on the
verge of death. Therefore, Wiesel experiences the evil of the death camp first hand and

finds himself all alone. Despite everything that he endures, Wiesel conveys the

importance of maintaining compassion in times of hardship.

Overall, Wiesel’s retelling of his time as a prisoner of the holocaust is meant to

shock the reader and honor the victims who died in the camps. By telling his story,

Wiesel hopes that history will never repeat itself and that people will learn to stand up

against bigotry. Furthermore, Wiesel communicates a larger human survival instinct and

the capability of compassion to meet the effects of cruelty.

Reflection

My purpose in revising this particular essay was to revisit a story that includes

material that I have studied in much greater depth with the Holocaust and see how my

perspective has changed. Overall, my writing expressed several good ideas but also

was weak in many areas. A part of this is that the prompt, to analyze the theme of ​Night​,

is relatively simple and doesn’t offer up as much area for analysis as an essay that

might’ve focused on Wiesel’s technique. My goal wasn’t necessarily to change the

message of my essay, but to provide greater depth and make it more succinct. Much of

my analysis was redundant and extremely simplistic. For example, my main argument in

the original essay was essentially that “nazis are evil”. While this is true, this is a widely

accepted fact that didn’t require so much exploration. Therefore, I chose to give the

essay more an emphasis on the durability of Wiesel and the ability of the prisoners of

the holocaust to withstand the various trials that they faced. Furthermore, my command
of the english language from that time was somewhat simple compared to now.

Changing the language of the ideas I expressed provided the essay with greater

complexity and a greater appearance of maturity. In conclusion, revising the essay may

not have completely fixed all of its problems, but did provide greater depth and stronger

language.