Elie Wiesel

[Name of the Institute]

Elie Wiesel

Introduction

Eliezer Wiesel is a survivor of the Nazi death camps of World War II and the preeminent chronicler of the horrors that he witnessed and endured. A novelist, playwright, essayist, historian, Wiesel has won an impressive number of awards for literature and humanitarianism; in 1986 he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. All his work is grounded in the Holocaust and its aftermath; his millions of readers are indelibly moved by his descriptions of this part of the Jewish experience, and of the faith in God that sustains a humanity who might otherwise have succumbed to despair. His first and best-known novel, Night (1960; published asLa Nuit in 1958), became part of The Night Trilogy, composed of Night, Dawn (1961; published as L'Aube in 1960), and The Accident (1962, published as Le Jour in 1961). Wiesel is driven by the need to speak out so people will know and remember, and by the opposite, the impossibility of words to describe the full extent of the horror. Always enveloping his writing in surrealism or opacity, Wiesel achieves an understated, mystical style that collides with the horrific reality that is his subject. Many critics of Wiesel's work point out that his descriptions of the Holocaust are a metaphor for the modern human condition.

Discussion

Wiesel's questioning of God results not in answers but in further questions. The author, like the biblical Jacob, wrestles with the deity. He stated in an interview that "ever since Auschwitz he has been trying to find an occupation for God". Gamaliel, the protagonist of The Time of the Uprooted, 2005 (Le Temps des déracinés, 2003) discovers the tension between faith and doubt. Rebbe Zusya, Gamaliel's mystical guide, declares that God calls to Gamaliel through his silence. The teacher then asks, "Are you answering Him?" Drawing ...