Monday 23 December 2019

Sofa Spotlight - Night, Elie Wiesel


It isn’t a Christmassy book to be finishing on but as it was the shortest day over the weekend it kind of fits. As well as that, it finishes off a year of reading that has unintentionally involved many books on the Holocaust or concentration camps. So what’s one more.

I’m not sure you can rate books like this against each other, but because of its length I would probably be inclined to recommend this one over the others. It is also readable and poignant beyond what words can describe.

The writer of the book shares his experiences of his time at Auschwitz. His arrival there is towards the end of the war and on his arrival prisoners are shocked that the new inmates have allowed themselves to be brought there. They had known, or at least heard rumours of what was happening to the Jews so why had they not already fled to safety. Wiesel describes his experiences of the concentration camp and also his struggle to reconcile what was happening to him and others with the God that he had been brought up to know. 


Like I say it’s not a long read, but it is certainly a powerful one that provides much food for thought. 

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