Night
My rating
5 / 5
Self-Purchased copy
Author
Elie Wiesel
Publisher
Penguin Books
Genre
Classic/Non-fiction/Memoir/Holocaust/World War II
Number of Pages
120
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Blurb
Born into a Jewish family in Romania, Elie Wiesel was a teenager when he and his family were rounded up by the Nazis, corralled into trains, and transported first to the Nazi death camp of Auschwitz and then to Buchenwald. This is his terrifying and intimate account of the increasing horrors he endured, the death of his parents and eight-year-old sister, and the loss of his innocence in barbaric hands.
Describing with immense power the murder of a people from a survivor’s perspective, Night is among the most personal and the poignant of all accounts of the Holocaust and provides rare insight into the darkest side of human nature. It is also a beacon for the enduring power of hope and continues to resonate with readers across the world today.
Marion Wiesel’s translation of her husband’s masterpiece presents the most accurate interpretation of his testimony in English and is accompanied by a preface by the author, in which he reflects on his lifelong dedication to ensuring that the world never forgets its own potential for inhumanity.
- Top Quotes from Night -
“Human suffering anywhere concerns men and women everywhere.”
“To forget the dead would be akin to killing them a second time.”
“Never shall I forget that night, the first night in camp, which has turned my life into one long night, seven times cursed and seven times sealed....Never shall I forget those moments which murdered my God and my soul and turned my dreams to dust. Never shall I forget these things, even if I am condemned to live as long as God Himself. Never.”
“I pray to the God within me that He will give me the strength to ask Him the right questions.”
“For the survivor who chooses to testify, it is clear: his duty is to bear witness for the dead and for the living. He has no right to deprive future generations of a past that belongs to our collective memory. To forget would be not only dangerous but offensive; to forget the dead would be akin to killing them a second time.”
“For in the end, it is all about memory, its sources and its magnitude, and, of course, its consequences.”
“One day when I was able to get up, I decided to look at myself in the mirror on the opposite wall. I had not seen myself since the ghetto. From the depths of the mirror, a corpse was contemplating me. The look in his eyes as he gazed at me has never left me.”
“...I believe it important to emphasize how strongly I feel that books, just like people, have a destiny. Some invite sorrow, others joy, some both.”
“I could tell you my adventures—beginning from this morning,” said Alice a little timidly; “but it’s no use going back to yesterday, because I was a different person then.”
“In the beginning there was faith - which is childish; trust - which is vain; and illusion - which is dangerous.”
Elie Wiesel
Elie Wiesel is the author of more than forty internationally acclaimed works of fiction and non-fiction. He has been awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the United Sates of America Congressional Gold Medal, the French Legion of Honor, and, in 198, the Nobel Peace Prize. He is the Andres W. Mellon Professor in the Humanities and University Professor of Boston University.
Marion Wiesel was born in Vienna. She has translated most of her husband’s works from original French into English.
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