In this quote, Elie is in a state of relief. After months of struggling to survive, forgetting his identity, and losing hope for God and everything. For months, Elie has not experienced anything human-like after being treated like an animal and constantly being reminded that he had no purpose in life other than to be inferior to the Germans and follow their orders. Elie believes that being alive is no different than being dead. To survive, Elie avoids sleep, believing that “to be asleep is to be dead”. Juliek playing the violin shone a little glimmer of hope into Elie as he had never heard a violin being played since before the Holocaust (when he was treated like a human). Elie is relieved to feel that it is no longer necessary to struggle to apply efforts to stay alive. …show more content…
Elie “was overcome by sleep” by the sound of the violin, showing how the violin was a symbol of humanity since sleeping was a human necessity. After waking up, Elie finds that both Juliek and the violin are dead. He uses personification to describe the remains of the violin as “an eerily poignant little corpse”. Violins do not have corpses, nor can they express feelings from their parts. But Elie describes the violin this way to show how he viewed the violin as a human, despite losing the belief in the existence of humans by the way he has seen “humans” act and what “humans” experience. Elie was never living in the Holocaust but rather just surviving. This quote connects to the larger theme of hope as Elie finally feels like a human and is able to believe that there may be a chance for humanity and survival. This quote is similar to a similar quote from early on in the book: “A truck drew close and unloaded its hold: small children. Babies! I love the sand! Yes, I did see this, with my own eyes. children thrown into the