aster and teacher of Hebrew. Wiesel later became a journalist, writing for the French newspaper L'Arche and the Israeli Yediot Ahronot. (www.sparknotes.com)
             Elie had vowed never to write about his Holocaust experiences, but in 1955, after meeting the French Catholic novelist and Nobel Laureate Francois Mauriac, he decided to write "And the World Remained Silent", a 900-page volume. The book was originally written in Yiddish and published in Buenos Aires, Argentina. After two years, it appeared again in a compressed, 127-page French version called La Nuit, and later in English as Night. (www.gradesaver.com)
             Night is narrated by Eliezer, a Jewish teenager who, lives in his hometown of Sighet, in Hungarian Transylvania. In the spring of 1944, the Nazis occupy Hungary. Not long after, a series of increasingly repressive measures are passed, and the Jews of Eliezer's town are forced into small ghettos within Sighet. Soon they are herded onto cattle cars, and a nightmarish journey takes place. After days and nights crammed into the car, exhausted and near starvation, the passengers arrive at Birkenau, the gateway to Auschwitz. (www.sparknotes.com)
             Upon his arrival in Birkenau, Eliezer and his father are separated from his mother and sisters, whom they never see again. The Jews are evaluated to determine whether they should be killed immediately or put to work. Eliezer and his father seem to pass the selection, but before they are brought to the prisoners' barracks, they stumble upon the open pit furnaces where the Nazis are burning infants and children by the truckload. (www.sparknotes.com)
             Eventually, their captors march them from Birkenau to the main camp, Auschwitz. They eventually arrive in Buna, a work camp. Under slave-labor conditions, and the frequent "selections," the Jews take heed in caring for each other, in health and in religion. In the camp, the Jews are subject to beatings and repeated h...