Viki's response 1 (Preface-46)

The best place to begin is in the preface, where Wiesel reflects on his imprisonment at Auschwitz and why he was driven to write Night,  previously titled in the original Yiddish, And The World Remained Silent. In my opinion, the first title should have stuck. I think this simply because when Wiesel translated and sent the manuscript all over the world wherever he could, it was rejected every time, and the world remained silent. When his story was finally published it was after numerous revisions, but Wiesel took it because he feared that if he didn't the stories would never really be known to anyone but him. He also mentions later on in the preface (rather, he quotes a section of the original Yiddish that had been cut from the final print) the anti-Semites who preached that the Holocaust was a lie. I understand that it's hard to admit that mankind can be so unkind, but isn't it better to recognize it so it doesn't happen again?

Next comes the actual text, chapter one. Wiesel reflects on his childhood and life before the German Army began to appear in their town. Moishe the Beadle, a man from Sighet (Wiesel's home town) who had been captured by Hitler's men and escaped, warned everyone when he returned that the German Army would be back for the rest of them and no one believed him. Within days the Germans were walking the streets and being friendly, perhaps trying to gain the people's trust before ruining their Passover celebration. Before long the Jews were forced out of their homes and sent to Auschwitz where their identities were stripped away and replaced by numbers, that is if they weren't killed first. From then on they were constantly beaten and only received small rations of food, bread and soup. The chapter ends when the remaining men (the ones who hadn't been taken to other camps for special skills) were sent to Buna.

As I was reading this, I couldn't help but pay attention to every little detail-tattooing numbers on the Jews instead of recognizing their names, stripping them and giving them identical clothes, shaving them, treating them all as if they were prisoners and not giving them any form of individuality. Also, even before going to the camps, the people of Sighet refused to believe that Germany was coming for them or that there was any threat in the German Army, even after one of their own warned them that these men were not to be trusted. I don't understand how any person can feel so much hate for a particular group of people if we are all human. I suppose that if I lived through Hitler's life I might understand where he was coming from, but there has been nothing in my life so far that would make me hate anyone so much, and I can't fathom anything the Jews did being so bad as to make someone want to erase their people. I can't help but wonder if Hitler had a personal reason or if his motives were purely selfish. If he was simply eradicating Jews for his own selfish reasons, I don't think he would have had so many followers. Then again, I've never fully understood racism or discrimination because I was raised with an open mind to most things, and I was raised to be kind to everyone I encounter. My biggest questions are what drove Hitler to these extremes? How could someone hate a race so much as to strip them of their identities and kill them so carelessly?