A Good Night?

A Good Night?


As I was pondering late one evening, the many different options of what to base my paper on, I suddenly had an epiphany on Night by Elie Wiesel. The realization came to me that the word night, in context with this Holocaust autobiography has many deep and hidden meanings. Night. How many metaphors for the simple word “night” is the author attempting to conjure up in a readers mind? A good night? A nightmare? The possibilities seem endless.

According to dictionary.com, the definition of Holocaust is “1. The great destruction resulting in the extensive loss of life 2. A great or complete devastation or destruction, esp. by fire.” In the novel Night, fire is used frequently. The Nazi’s lives were based on fire: they killed, ruled and destroyed with fire. Eliezer himself lost his father in the crematory. Even from afar one could see the rising flames coming from the crematory. Vivid descriptions of flames and smoke were common visions to those sentenced in the death camps. The stench of burning flesh filled the air, air that was associated with life now come to represent death. The blaze of the fire signified not light, but darkness, a darkness dwelling in the hearts of the wicked regime. No day here, only night. Long, seemingly endless nights. The attempts of Hitler to dehumanize the Jews by disorientation and disassociation were so trying,
that life seemed to be one long “night”. A confusion that would penetrate to a man’s core, but the harsh reality, ripe with pain, reminded a man daily that this sentence in the death camps was to be called life. Day, night. Night, day. Light is dark? No wonder the confusion.

Night in the Holocaust was not something that only happened once the sun went down. Night was a constant feeling in the hearts and minds of those living that nightmare. During any given moment in this nightmare one could feel their heart beating while still fighting for those last few breaths of life. The next, it could all be taken away from them.

Six million heartbeats silenced? I think not! They continue to beat, through our actions and good deeds today. Heartbeats that triumphantly bring us closer and closer to the light of day, that time when “night” will permanently be put to sleep.