In the memoir Night, by Elie Wiesel, he writes about his survivor's perspective of his experience during the Holocaust. In his memoir, Elie uses language techniques such as repetition, dialogue, and first-person narration to make us understand his experience. His memoir makes me feel heartbroken and bitter that this could happen to people.
Elie Wiesel talks about his first night in the Auschwitz concentration camp and all the horror he sees. For example, the babies being burnt alive. Elie explains this with a prose poem, "Never shall I forget the small faces of the children whose bodies I saw transformed into smoke under a silent sky." The technique of the prose poem is repetition. Elie repeats the words, "Never shall I forget," seven times. This point helps emphasise his first night there and all the horrible things he sees. The technique makes me aware of all the disturbing things people are capable of doing. This prose poem makes me feel devastated as I picture the faces of all the children I know and imagine that they'll never be able to see their families again.
When Elie was working at the factory, he came across a French woman who said these words when he needed encouragement, "Bite your lips, little brother...don't cry. Keep your anger, your hate, for another day, for later." He writes this text as a dialogue, and Elie repeats the conversion he has. The effect of this technique is to show that the French woman is giving her trust to him by revealing her identity by showing that she could speak German. The way Elie described his experience in the camp using dialogue makes me feel hopeful that someone is looking out for him in a time of such darkness.
When Elie's father is severely unwell and dies, Elie doesn't feel sad or miserable. He feels free, "Deep inside me, if I could have searched the recesses of my feeble conscience, I might have found something like: Free at last!" He uses the technique of first-person narration when using the first-person pronouns 'me/I/my'. The effect of the first-person narration shows that Eile is looking deeper into himself, finding the ugliness within him. How he described this part of his life made me feel pity for him having to think this way about his father, especially at a young age, watching his father give up, not having the will to live. Elie had to look out for himself. For this, I don't have any judgement towards him for thinking that.
In conclusion, Elie Wiesel's memoir Night uses language techniques such as repetition, dialogue, and first-person narration to show us that the Holocaust had a terrible and sad effect on Jewish families. In my opinion, I hope that the world has learned about the Holocaust from Ellie Wiesel's memoir. When I read Night I had sad and emotional feelings about the Holocaust, reading about everything Elie went through. Hopefully, lives will never be lost in such violent ways ever again.
