Socratic Seminar Questions 1. Both books can be considered “coming of age” subject matter. How do Elie and Liesel change? Both Elie and Liesel change throughout their respective books. In Night, Elie begins as a Jewish youth, almost thirteen, who wants to study the Kabbalah and delve into the secrets of mysticism. As his life progresses, he witnesses the ugly side of human nature. He loses his faith in God, for His mercy is nowhere to be found. On the other hand, in the beginning of The Book Thief, Liesel, a girl not even ten years of age, is placed in a foster home after being traumatized by the death of her brother. There, she experiences love and loss, joy and pain. She discovers the power of words, and how, just like life, they are both …show more content…
In Night, People are starving, and many will do anything it takes to abate their hunger, to survive. Once, Elie witnessed a son killing his father for some bread. In The Book Thief, food is scarce, and although its absence does not lead Liesel anywhere close to killing, it does cause her to steal. On the other hand, food can also be shared. Elie gives up his rations for his father even though he will probably die, and Liesel’s family shares the little food they have with Max despite the fact that they are already taking a huge risk by simply hiding him in their home. 4. Is there a different attitude toward children in both books versus the children of today? Discuss the role that youth play in each. There is a completely different attitude towards children today, especially due to technology and the altered perspective of the world. In Night, the horrors done to the Jewish are exponentially worse when done to the youth. Infants are burned alive, an angelic child is hanged, and Elie himself is merely a teenager when he is forced into a concentration camp. Forced to endure such hardships at such a young age, he is left traumatized. In The Book Thief, Liesel, in her youth, sees the world differently from adults. She steals, fights, and loves. As a child, she is passionate and filled with adrenaline. 5. Examine the role of music in both Night and The Book Thief. What does music
6) Although Atticus did not want his children in court, he defends Jem's right to know what has happened. Explain, in your own words, Atticus's reasons for this
In life, people go through different changes when put through difficult experiences. In the book Night, Elie Wiesel is a young Jewish boy whose family is sent to a concentration camp by Nazis. The story focuses on his experiences and trials through the camp. Elie physically becomes more dehumanized and skeletal, mentally changes his perspective on religion, and socially becomes more selfish and detached, causing him to lose many parts of his character and adding to the overall theme of loss in Night.
Both The Book Thief and Night revolve around the idea of the Holocaust. With this, the reader is able to see the contrast between two different people at the time. Night by Elie Wiesel provides the perspective from the inside of concentration camps, while The Book Thief by Markus Zusak provides the perspective from those living in Nazi Germany. By reading both perspectives, the reader is given the thoughts and feelings of both people connecting all people of the time period, coming to the conclusion that all people were suffering loss of faith in God and
When most people think about a life of abandonment, they probably see that life as one filled with suffering. In “The Book Thief” abandonment is a central topic throughout this novel. The abandonment through Liesel’s life helps develop her character in the novel. This abandonment happens through family, friends, and mentors. Through acts of both circumstance and heart she constantly feels abandoned, but through the course of these events she eventually finds happiness from it all.
Time is one of the biggest inconsistencies in our world. Sometimes a second may seem like an hour, and a day may seem like a minute. Our relative perception of time is based solely on the circumstances surrounding that moment. For Elie, one of the first instances where time became a major factor in the
During the Holocaust, Eliezer Wiesel changes from a spiritual, sensitive, little boy to a spiritually dead, dispassionate man. In his memoir, Night, Elie speaks about his experiences upon being a survivor of the Holocaust. The reader sees how Elie has changed through his experiences in Sighet and the ghettos in comparison to what it was like for him in the concentration camps.
In Night, the set change from Elie’s hometown Sighet to the concentration camps truly embodies the change of Elie’s character. At the beginning of the book, Elie portrays himself as a person who desire to learn about the Jewish religion. Moreover, he even finds a teacher to help him to learn about the very essence of the divinity of the Jewish religion, “ I became convinced that Moishe the Beadle would help me enter eternity, into that time when question and answer would become ONE ”(5). In this case, Elie believes god controls humans and god can answer any questions he has. Conversely, as the setting shifts to the concentration camp, the reality of his faith reveals “ Never shall I forget those moments murdered my god and my soul and turned my dreams to ashes”(34). In the concentration camp, he starts to lose faith in god when he sees god doesn’t help them when dehumanizing actions occur on Jews. Specifically, on the Jewish holiday Appelplatz, he questions and criticizes god , “ Why, but why would I bless him? [...] Because he kept six crematoria working day and night, including Sabbath and the Holy Days? ” (67) By this time, Elie tears off his mask of still believe in god and reveals his true identity: God does not exist, he is hopeless. Moreover, the shift also affects the mood of the story which it transfers the mood from hopefulness to despair and hatred. While in the movie The Boy in the Striped Pajamas, the coming-of-age genre facilitates the illustration of appearance and reality. Initially, when Bruno still lives in Berlin, he plays with his friends all the time and portrays himself as an explorer. When his family moves to the new residence near the camp , however, his parents tell him he can’t play in the back garden and can’t be an explorer anymore. Out of curiosity, he eventually breaks the rule and jump over the back garden. After running through the forest, he
On the upcoming block day we will have a Socratic Seminar in which we discuss the chapters in To Kill a Mockingbird that deal with Tom Robinson’s trial and its aftermath. Your assignment is to prepare for the seminar ahead of time, participate in the seminar and capture the main ideas of the discussion in your notes.
People can change very much in bad situations like the people in the Holocaust, more specifically, Elie Wiesel, a 15 year old who got sent to a concentration camp in Auschwitz. In the book “Night” by Elie Wiesel, the main character, Elie, changed in many ways throughout the book because of the different experiences and sights he had to go through in Auschwitz.
In the novel “Night” by Elie Wiesel the theme of self preservation and loss of identity plays a critical role in the development of Eliezer (Elie Wiesel) throughout the book. As Wiesel suffers through the tragic events of the holocaust, self preservation proves to be more difficult to keep and losing one’s character seems easy. Wiesel’s identity, faith, and his will to live start to fade as he begins to forms a new character, a character who remains silent. Losing identity means losing the values that makes up a character.
In the novel Night by Elie Wiesel and The Book Thief by Markus Zusak, both authors uses stories of failure and suffering in order make the reader feel pity for the main characters and a bit of surprise toward at what horrible acts humanity is willing to commit during desperate times. The novel Night, by Elie Wiesel is about the author’s days during the time he was imprisoned at various concentration camps, Wiesel had suffered both physically and mentally, especially with his father dying towards the end. The Book Thief is about the story of a girl named Liesel Meminger and what happened after her mother handed her off to two foster parents named Hans and Rosa Hubermann. Even though Liesel was not imprisoned like Elie, she still faces many problems such as the nightmares she experienced every night.
As humas we are constantly changing and adaping to fit our envionment. Humans also can have mood changes due to age, rough times or any other driving force. In the book “Night” Elie goes throug many changes because of the poor conditions in Auschuwiz. Elie had to change his ways in order to survive and keep his loved ones by his side. Over the course of the book, Elie changed the way he acted towards people, loved ones, and things he knew to be true.
In the beginning of the book, Elie is a studious Jewish boy who seeks for a deeper understanding of his religion. However, when Elie and his family gets forced to go to a concentration camp called Auschwitz, he sees babies getting
One of the most tragic themes in Night is Elie’s discovery of the way that atrocities and cruel treatment can break the humanity of decent people turning them into brutes. Throughout his times of hardship, Elie didn't break and he kept his humanity. Tragic events during the story most likely affected him and how he thinks witnessing it at a young age. Elie did many actions to protect and stay with his father and stay sane during the time in the camps. During the long walk after evacuating Auschwitz, the Nazis started a selection to get rid of the weak and continue onward with the strong.
In the beginning of the book, Night, Elie started out as a free man. Life was peaceful and great, he had no worry in the world. The book explains one of Elie and his family's day;