How Does Elie Wiesel Use Traumatizing Ordeals In The Book Night

“I was desensitized to all the pain, even though it was essentially all around me.”--Julie Wenzel When one is surrounded by traumatizing encounters, one will get used to it. To illustrate in the novel Night, Elie Wiesel and millions of other Jews experiences the same ordeals while they are being forced into concentration camps and went through traumatizing ordeals. There, the prisoners are worked to oblivion, or they are incinerated upon arrival. The captives are eventually killed or liberated, however if they survive, they would be in a at a stage where they act as if dead. Like lifeless people, many prisoners forfeited their emotions over time due to the brutal scenes that that the inmates and Jews are exposed to during the Holocaust. Initially,

Likewise, the death marches exemplifies the conditions that the inmates are familiar to. The author experiences comrades giving up and dying, knowing that dying is a better outcome than the actions present. When running during the death march, Elie Wiesel starts to ponder about “the idea of dying” because he is so tired and no longer cares about any human existence, including himself, because of the brutality he witnesses while on the death march; wanting to be like so many of his comrades. (Wiesel 86). The sheer number of casualties that each captive bear witness to creates the feeling that all emotions are devoid. Wanting to die only happens when people are at a certain stage where they are emotionally dead and experience carrion-like emotions. During the author and the other prisoners rush to the camps, they are causing the demise of their comrades. Knowing they could avoid it, the captives trample the unlucky who fall in a rush to preserve themselves. They have no emotion for the person they are standing on, even if they are there family, which elaborates the savagery the inmates are forced to become. This is shown when the captives were crushing “men, trampl[ing] underfoot dying” in the rush to the next concentration camp (Wiesel 89). Events similar to crushing the former inmates shows how much each prisoner is emotionally dead. Near the end, the still-alive prisoners are at the lowest possible stage of their pride and feelings due to the pain that are inflicted upon them. By the end of the journey to Gleiwitz, affected by the horrendous actions inflicted by the Nazis, the captives kill their own comrades, and do not have feeling for their death or life, they are simply mentally