Free-write: The committee that created the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C. is erecting two new monuments, and you have been asked to select one quotation from Night for the monument that represents Auschwitz-Birkenau. What quotation would you select? I ask you not only to identify the quotation you would use, but also explain why you chose it.
General questions:
1. The reader experiences Wiesel's anger not at the Germans but at his faith. What does this anger suggest about the depths of his faith? How have the experiences at Auschwitz affect his faith?
2. How has Wiesel's relationship with his father changed? What has each come to represent to the other?
3. The choiceless choice: do Wiesel and his father make the right choice in leaving the infirmary? How does the decision help us understand why many survivors attribute their survival to luck? Wiesel clearly knows the fate of the infirmary patients. Would you want to know this kind of information after making such a difficult decision?
4. Biblical references: Job, Last judgment, Adam & Eve, Noah, Sodom.
How the memoir is crafted:
1. Why do you think Elie Wiesel tells this story in the first person perspective? If Night were written in the third person, would it be more or less believable.
2. Night is written in short, simple sentences. Critics call this kind of writing "controlled." Every word has been carefully chosen for precise meaning. How does this style of writing compare with Wiesel's experiences in the concentration camps?
Videos:
1. Elie Wiesel at Buchenwald, 6/09
2. Twins story of survival
3. Auschwitz Album
4. Young girl's story of survival
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