Product Description
Night is Elie Wiesel's masterpiece, a candid, horrific, and deeplypoignant autobiographical account of his survival as a teenager in theNazi death camps. This new translation by Marion Weisel, Elie's wifeand frequent translator, presents this seminal memoir in the languageand spirit truest to the author's original intent.And in thesubstantive new preface, Elie Wiesel reflects on the enduringimportance of Night and his lifelong, passionate dedication toensuring that the world never forgets man capacity for inhumanity toman.

Night offers much more than a litany of the daily terrors, everydayperversions, and rampant sadism at Auschwitz and Buchenwald; it alsoeloquently addresses many of the philosophical as well as personalquestions implicit in any serious consideration of what the Holocaustwas, what it meant, and what its legacy is and will be.Amazon.com Review
In Nobel laureate Elie Wiesel's memoir Night, a scholarly, pious teenager is wracked with guilt at having survived the horror of the Holocaust and the genocidal campaign that consumed his family. His memories of the nightmare world of the death camps present him with an intolerable question: how can the God he once so fervently believed in have allowed these monstrous events to occur? There are no easy answers in this harrowing book, which probes life's essential riddles with the lucid anguish only great literature achieves. It marks the crucial first step in Wiesel's lifelong project to bear witness for those who died. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (712)

Night
The book "Night" describes some of the horrors that took place in Auschwitz during World War II, more specifically it describes the tragedies Elie Wiesel faces during his year-long stay at the camp. It describes how God is "murdered" to the young boy as he watches the heartless Nazis torture those around him, which include family, friends, neighbors, and etc. The book is written from the perspective of Elie Wiesel, A young, Hungarian, Jewish boy, who expresses the Jewish culture through the diction of the book. He uses phrases such as"to travel by rail"(pg.11), which most American-English speaking people would not use. Also, the Jews are portrayed as very optimistic (at least for the position they're in), throughout the book they hold on to every bit of good news given to them and even try to sing hymns to lift their spirits. Also, the Jews are polite when talking to each other even in a time of extreme distress, which you wouldn't find among many cultures. Also, the Jews speak much more formally than in many cultures.

Why?

This is an eloquent book about a very sad episode in European history, about how a substantial number of civilized people raised on Christian principles did their utmost to kill everyone raised on earlier religious ideals.

Wiesel presents eloquent testimony about the terror of this era;but, he fails to explain "Why?"A few years earlier, much the same fate befell Armenians in Turkey.In the 19th century, the ultimate sport in Newfoundland was to kill a Beothuk, a greater challenge than simply killing deer.The last Beothuk was a young girl killed for her scalp.

But what of Rwanda, as UN forces stood aside?What of the Balkans 10 years ago?Or Darfur in recent years?Or the Sunni versus Shiite suicide bombings now?At least Count Vlad Dracul, from the same region in which Wiesel was brought up, dealt with the dishonest.

Why?Perhaps this question has no answer.Much involves attitudes to others;Beothuks were considered as less than real people.Many Europeans who took part in the Holocaust regarded the Jews as less than human;nothing infuriates a bully more than a victim who refuses to resist.

But then, how does one explain a Bernie Madoff who took the funds Wiesel had raised for his foundation and lost them in vast fraud.Why would one Jew treat another in this manner?Madoff can hardly say that Wiesel "should have known better."

The horror shown by Wiesel shows what people do;one telling example is bystanders throwing bread to starving camp inmates to watch them fight over scraps of food.He compares it to a rich tourist on a cruise liner tossing coins into the water to watch children fight each other for these little bits of money.

Why?The tourist explained, "It's charity."

Such examples make Wiesel's story relevant;as history, and as current events.Perhaps the frightening answer is that there is no answer.Liberty is doing good for others; the love of power over others is the love of oneself.Then what is our future?

Wiesel's night didn't end when American forces reached Buchenwald;we still live in the night of horror.

WOW
Horrific. it's... horrific.A must read though. Because it shows what humans are capable of, it should be read by all.

Night
I have known for a while that I was going to read this book memoir for a while, as it is part of my schools curriculum. So, I knew I was going to read it, but I was never prepared for what I would be reading.

Our school's experience is very special during our time reading this memoir, along with many other works on the holocaust. We have holocaust survivors visit, send our art pieces to be displayed in the Holocaust Memorial Museum in DC, and even write back in forth to Elie Wiesel. Night is a big part of our learning.

Night was originally written in Yiddish, Elie's native language. That is the reason I suspect the writing is not the best I have read. I don't blame Elie, I blame the translators. But even though the writing is not amazing, the story is unforgettable.

I really had no idea what really happened during the holocaust. But now that I have read Night, I will always know. And I will never forget. This memoir is so extremely raw, it doesn't water anything down. I am so thankful for this because when there are no survivors left, the world will need works like this to get a feel for what really happened. Of course, few people will ever really know, but if they read this, they can at least see what it was like from the eyes of a survivor.

I will never be able to know what really happened in those concentration camps, where millions of people were ruthlessly tortured and killed, but now that I have read Night, I will never forget to remember.

A Voice for Those Lost in the Night
As a student, I chose to read this book for its historical value, but as I read the story, my emotions became intertwined with the author's.Night by Elie Wiesel is so much more than a book of dates and events.It is the story untold by those who were murdered in the Holocaust.It is the raw experience of a young boy who was forced to live through it.

Wiesel describes the physical burden throughout his very own persecution but also the mental and emotional agony of everyone around him.He captures the hope of children and parents along with the sorrow of the damned.Wiesel lives through the Holocaust to tell his story but not without hardship.Besides fighting the weakness and pain of his own body, he internally battles with himself.The liberation of death is always on Wiesel's mind.His faith in the one God he has devoted his life to is questioned.

This short book will grip all readers past the last page.It is the voice for all those not as lucky as Elie Wiesel.I am more grateful for my own life after reading Night.I strongly recommend this book to any audience. ... Read more

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Customer Reviews (13)

Thought this would be different
I've just started my journey into reading about the Holocaust and Nazi's.My first was Victor Frankl's "Man's Search for Meaning" and I appeared to have an incorrectly preconceived notion on what a Nobel Prize winning author would write about; actually I don't quite know what I was looking to find.The read was intense yet quite easy to understand; but, did little beyond giving the sense that if you survive an incident like this you question why.It has furthered my interest in reading other books on the timeframe.I would certainly purchase it again.

Hard to find book
Just what I was looking for.Quick transaction and shipping was great.

A Necessary Read for Humanity
"Night" is without a doubt, the best of the three works in the trilogy. Wiesel's experiences are heart-breaking, yet he retells his story with a degree of frankness that illustrates the complete emotional breakdown that victims of the concentration camps experienced. "Night" is an horrifying account of the Holocaust, and it ought to be read for years to come as a reminder to what can happen when mankind loses its humanity. Although Wiesel prefaces "Dawn" and "Day" as being works of fiction, the two stories are much less fictional narratives then they are brief insights into the mind of a man who has been emotionally broken by the horrors he experienced. To read "Dawn" and "Day" without associating them with Wiesel as their author would be a mistake, as Wiesel's questioning of God's existence and the goodness of humanity is inherent in both works.

Great Book
This book is great.Obviously Night was the best portion as I thought Dawn and Day were a little slow, but I would definitely recommend this book to anyone interested in this genre.

Depressing
A laborious trilogy.Everything is so black.I understand it was a horrible, horrible time in history and for the people who had to deal with it and are still dealing with it.How they kept their sanity under such conditions and live with such memories is amazing.The only light is in the last few pages and is worth the labor.God gets blamed for the acts of the devil, however. ... Read more

Product Description
An autobiographical narrative, in which the author describes his experiences in Nazi concentration camps.Amazon.com Review
In Nobel laureate Elie Wiesel's memoir Night, a scholarly, pious teenager is wracked with guilt at having survived the horror of the Holocaust and the genocidal campaign that consumed his family. His memories of the nightmare world of the death camps present him with an intolerable question: how can the God he once so fervently believed in have allowed these monstrous events to occur? There are no easy answers in this harrowing book, which probes life's essential riddles with the lucid anguish only great literature achieves. It marks the crucial first step in Wiesel's lifelong project to bear witness for those who died. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (932)

Introduction to the Holocaust
I read "Night" because my son was reading it, for school I think. With so much written now about the Holocaust, few remember that survivors didn't want to talk about their experience in the early years. Elie Wiesel waited a decade in silence, and then wrote "Night" for the wider public. It is short, terse, factual. A good and well-known introduction to the Holocaust. If you want to know what happened, as experienced by one average European Jewish teenager, start with Night. If you want to know how it could happen, though, you'll have to read much more, for example Hitler's Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust
by Daniel Jonah Goldhagen.

Honest and True -- Very, *Very* Powerful
The quote from the New York Times on the cover of this book has it exactly right: "a slim volume of terrifying power." Wiesel's retelling of his experiences in the Auschwitz concentration camp is concise and seemingly artless. But the absence of sentimental pathos only makes the story so much more moving, so much more powerful. I first listened to this novel as an audio book some five or six years ago, and the experience was overwhelming. Since then, I've listened to it again perhaps five times, I've read it in the French original twice, and I've read the English translation by Stella Rodway once. I now know it almost by heart. Certain passages from the book would haunt my imagination for weeks, leaving an indelible imprint on my soul. For instance, I feel I know with certainty that I will remember the fate of Moshe the Beadle -- a human being of flesh and blood who once lived and breathed, and whose story is told here in but a few pages -- until my dying day. 'Never shall I forget that night' -- this is a very, *very* powerful book.

For what it is worth, I would recommend this translation rather than the new one by Marion Wiesel, the author's wife. However, I say this without actually having read the newer translation, so I should probably admit that my judgment here doesn't carry much weight. I only read the first pages of both books side by side, and this gave me the impression that Rodway's rendition was somehow more poetic, and perfectly accurate when compared with the French version. For instance, Rodway's "I loved his great, dreaming eyes, their gaze lost in the distance." sounds better to me than Marion Wiesel's "As for me, I liked his wide, dreamy eyes, gazing off into the distance." (he's talking about Moshe the Beadle), and the French does have the verb 'love.' But perhaps I only prefer the earlier translation because this was the one I first encountered and grew attached to. Nevertheless, since it seems likely now that most new readers will first turn to the translation endorsed by Oprah's Book Club, I think there is at least a point in exhorting people not to forget about the earlier version.

Darkly Revelatory
When a teenager, Elie Wiesel was taken from his home, and he and his family were put in a series of concentration camps over several years. Night is the haunting record of that experience, as bleakly unflinching a memoir as has ever been written. Few can know the horrors of not only spending teenage years in such a place but also seeing family members and many others die and countless others suffer. Needless to say, Wiesel's own plight was also tragically great, and he unsurprisingly lost both innocence and faith. The experience touched him so deeply that he was unable to write of it for over a decade. When he finally did, he had great difficulty getting published; the events were still very close, and the world wanted to forget rather than being reminded. However, when published in 1960, Night was an international sensation, reawakening interest in the Holocaust and all it stands for. It was not only a literary triumph but the first step in Wiesel's core belief that we must always remember the Holocaust so nothing like it ever happens again.

The book remains undeniably compelling, a masterpiece on many levels. Perhaps most immediately, it is a stark depiction of evil's height, showing humanity at its worst. This is valuable in every sense from philosophical to sociological but above all in destroying hollow optimism epitomized in the belief that things will take care of themselves and all will work out for the best. Night leaves no doubt that, left unchecked, human evil grows exponentially; it is our duty to curb it, and the awareness raised by such works is a very important part of this. Second, it is an invaluable historical document, one of the best - most thorough and readable - primary sources of the Holocaust's unparalleled miseries. As such, it is one of the darkest works ever - all the more so in being true; even the blackest imagination could not conceive such atrocities, which says all that need be said about this aspect of Night and the events it records.

Yet there are several strong senses in which the book is not bleak. First, it is an artistic masterpiece; unwavering honesty and vivid description raise it above mere memoir, putting it with the most harrowing and unforgettable first-person accounts ever. Its biggest strength in this way is unadorned yet highly effective prose. Wiesel has no time for dizzying metaphors, lush descriptions, or other fancy writing; he has a bitter story to tell and tells it as plainly and - in the best way - as simply as possible. This makes it clearer and more memorable than it could ever have been otherwise, forcing us to focus on the events rather than the writing. The story speaks for itself as few can. Though barely one hundred pages, it has more of substance and significance than nearly any other book. The words are few but the implications endless.

Perhaps more fundamentally, though Night is a savage condemnation of human evil, it is also a tribute to human endurance. Like a surprising number of others, Wiesel survived the Holocaust despite everything, showing just how far human beings can be pushed and live. Such determination and perseverance is truly incredible, a testament to the indomitable human spirit that is at least as astonishing in its way as the evil that confronted it and far more awe-inspiring. Wiesel not only lived but, in a long career starting with Night, has admirably devoted his life to exposing the Holocaust's monstrosities to guard future ages against recurring evil.

Night is a profoundly important document in this and many other ways, a must for anyone even remotely interested in the Holocaust, World War II, Judaism, or the depths to which humanity can sink - as well as, in one sense at least, all that it can rise above. It is nothing less than one of the most important and valuable books of all-time. Though a very painful read, everyone should read it if only to see just how painful life can be - and hopefully to avoid passing the pain on to those lucky enough to have been born after the nightmares it faithfully records.

As for this edition, it has a short Preface and a somewhat longer and older Introduction by Francois Mauriac, who knew Wiesel. Both give some interesting background on Wiesel and the book but are not revelatory. Anyone who comes across this will get a quality version, but some of the later ones, which have Wiesel Prefaces, are probably better.

Powerful!
THis book was very powerful and moving while at the same time disturbing.I had my children read it.I want them to really understand what took place during the Holocaust and to see the resilence of people. This should be required reading in history class.

pretty good book
The beginning of this book bored me so it took me about 1 1/2 hours to read the first chapter. I was surprised that Elie described everything with lots of detail. It also surprised how brutal people were during the Holocaust. In the end I thought this was a pretty good book and would recommend it to anyone willing to learn a lot about the Holocaust. ... Read more

Product Description
From the Nobel laureate and author of the masterly Night, a deeply felt, beautifully written novel of morality, guilt, and innocence.

Despite personal success, Yedidyah—a theater critic in New York City, husband to a stage actress, father to two sons—finds himself increasingly drawn to the past. As he reflects on his life and the decisions he’s made, he longingly reminisces about the relationships he once had with the men in his family (his father, his uncle, his grandfather) and the questions that remain unanswered. It’s a feeling that is further complicated when Yedidyah is assigned to cover the murder trial of a German expatriate named Werner Sonderberg. Sonderberg returned alone from a walk in the Adirondacks with an elderly uncle, whose lifeless body was soon retrieved from the woods. His plea is enigmatic: “Guilty . . . and not guilty.”

These words strike a chord in Yedidyah, plunging him into feelings that bring him harrowingly close to madness. As Sonderberg’s trial moves along a path of dizzying yet revelatory twists and turns, Yedidyah begins to understand his own family’s hidden past and finally liberates himself from the shadow it has cast over his life.

With his signature elegance and thoughtfulness, Elie Wiesel has given us an enthralling psychological mystery, both vividly dramatic and profoundly emotional. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

A short readable novel by a true master.
This is Wiesel's first novel in awhile.I love his writing.This is a story within a story.It is a story of a man's life & a story of a criminal case the man covered as a theater critic.The case evolves from a simple case of murder to a case involving false identities & the Holocaust.The narrator also has an identity he can't remember, since he was a Jewish child who was sent away to be saved during the Holocaust.He remembers parents lost but forgotten.He remembers being unwanted by the family of the girl who saved him.He loves his Grandfather, who came from the family who adopted him.Who nurtured him & who loves him & where do his own wife & children fit into his life?Wiesel takes all these questions & molds them into this short & very readable novel. ... Read more

Product Description
A poignant, powerful distillation of the Holocaust experience from the internationally acclaimed writer and Nobel laureate.

In his first book, Night, Elie Wiesel described his concentration camp experience, but he has rarely written directly about the Holocaust since then. Now, as the last generation of survivors is passing and a new generation must be introduced to mankind’s darkest hour, Wiesel sums up the most important aspects of Hitler’s years in power and provides a fitting memorial to those who suffered and perished. He writes about the creation of the Third Reich, Western acquiescence, the gas chambers, and memory. He criticizes Churchill and Roosevelt for what they knew and ignored, and he praises little-known Jewish heroes. Augmenting Wiesel’s text are testimonies from survivors, who recall, among other moments and events: the establishment of the Nurembourg Laws, Kristallnacht, transport to the camps, and liberation.

With this book—richly illustrated with 45 photographs from the U.S. Holocaust
Museum—Wiesel proves once again the ineluctable importance of bearing witness. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (9)

After the Darkness
Love this man, Eli Wiesel, any book he wrote is great and huge knowledge of history
His book make the reader feel as part of being there sad and knowledgeable

Let Us Never Forget
Difficult to read ....so sad that this was allowed to happen.Let us never forget and hopefully we will not allow it to ever happen again.

After the Darkness: a review
For the first time, Elie Wiesel actually talks about the Holocaust. This is a great summary for those who don't know but should know what happened during this very dark period of humanity. Again, like the rest of Wiesel's work, it is a must-buy.

A Must Read
Elie Wiesel summarizes the horrors of the holocaust. This is an historical book that belongs on every homes bookcase.

after the darkness
I believe this book is a wonderful introduction to the history and events leading up to, and including the horrible years of the holocaust.I gave it to my grandaughter who is ten years old.I am a child of a survivor.The book is a valuable part of education of a time that now seems so distant, and when most of the survivors have died.It speaks for them to future generations
nd as always, Elie Wiesel is warm, and honest, but never bitter.We are now the witnesses for those who experienced hell. ... Read more

Product Description
From his early years with his loving Jewish family to the horrors of Auschwitz to his life as a Nobel Prize-winning novelist, Elie Wiesel tells his story. Passionate and poignant, All Rivers Run to the Sea is an unforgettable book of love and rage, doubt and faith, despair and trust, and ultimately, of wisdom. of photos.Amazon.com Review
The long-awaited memoirs of Wiesel, winner of the 1986 Nobel Peace Prize, tell the story of his happy childhood in the Carpathian Mountains, hissubsequent years of hell in Auschwitz and Buchenwald, and his post-war life in France, where he discovered his voice as a writer.Highly recommended. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (22)

Cascading Memories
Elie Wiesel may be best known as the author of "Night", his harrowing and sparse account of his time spent in the concentration camps.His literary works have focused around the events that shaped Holocaust survivors and the questions those survivors had about their faith afterwards.His life's work is heavily imbued by those events early in his life, his novels vast testaments to making sure the world never forgets the atrocities man inflicted upon man.

Yet there are many sides to this amazing man, which can often be forgotten when one dwells solely on his literary works.The first volume of Wiesel's memoirs, "All Rivers Run to the Sea", is a brilliant introduction and elucidation of the author.He relates quickly his early childhood and his time in the camps, but moves onto and focuses on his path after those events.As he forges a career as a journalist, meeting statesmen and celebrities, he finds himself and what causes he is willing to fight for.As a stateless person, his life is often difficult as he arouses suspicion, and he struggles constantly to make ends meet.Reading about his personal adventures, the reader sees how he is passionate, full of empathy, timid and captivating, a brilliant man with many stories to tell.

For anyone who has read Wiesel's writings, the style of "All Rivers Run to the Sea" will be just as familiar: while it is divided into sections, his reminiscenses are as tangential as his fictional stories.Learning about his real-life adventures, readers can easily see how Wiesel has woven his experiences into all of his fictional works.The praises and accolades he has received are more than well deserved, for as long as he writes, his people will have a testimony to their past and to their faith.

Memoirs of a a gadol b'Israel
This spectacular memoir of Elie Wiesel, the great author and voice of conscience, begins with his boyhood in the small Transylvanian village of Sighet.

A pious child, with a great thirst for Jewish knowledge, a student of Torah and Talmud, and fascinated with the Kabbalah. Elie is swept into the Nazi ghetto and then death cams where he loses his parents and his beautiful little blond sister Tzipora, all of whom perished in the Nazi furnaces.

He writes in memory of his losses:

"If only I could recapture my father's wisdom, my little sister's innocent grace. If only I could recapture the rage of the resistance fighter, the suffering of the mystic dreamer, the solitude of the orphan in a sealed cattle car, the death of each and every one of them. If only I could step out of myself and merge with them".

Wiesel writes of the prophecy told to his mother by the Wizhnitz Rabbi that her son would become a gadol b'Israel (a great man in Israel) but that she would not live to see it.

Wiesel records some of the horrors he witnessed in the death camps such as live children being thrown into furnaces by the Nazis, and laments the inaction by the Allies to do anything about the extermination they knew was taking place of the Jews- saving Jews was not a priority for the Allies either.

He mentions that most of the Jews who collaborated with the Nazis were intellectuals- not surprising in light of the fact hat most Jews who have thrown themselves into the campaign of hate against their fellow Jews in Israel.

He writes about the liberation of the death camps by the Allies after the war, and how one of the youngest child survivors of Buchenwald was eight year old Israel Meir Lau, later to be the Chief Ashkenazic Rabbi of Israel. In his section of his travels around the world as a young man during the early 1950s he writes of his great compassion at the plight of poverty-stricken children in India.

Wiesel records his life in a youth home for Jewish refugees in Paris and the fate of displaced Jews after World War II, his life as a journalist for Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronot for whom he covered the Eichmann trial, civil rights struggles, the Six Day War, the 1968 Student insurrections in France, and other world events.

He has always been greatly interested in philosophy and parapsychology and writes of his discussions with such great leaders as Golda Meir and David
Ben-Gurion, as well as the greatest thinkers of the day. He writes of his great love for Israel and it's people for which he has been attacked by the hate-filled bigots of the International Left. He also took a strong stand for persecuted Soviet Jewry during the 1960s and 1970s. Elie Wiesel also writes of his great compassion for humanity as a whole, such as his pain at seeing the suffering of destitute children during his travels in India. But unlike certain Jews of the Left, he does not see a contradiction between this and his great love of Israel and the Jewish people- Ahavat Israel.

He writes with great compassion, passion, anger, sadness and hope.
In a plea for the plight of his own people today, especially the youth and children of Israel today targeted by terror and forces of genocide (such as Hamas, Hezbollah and the Ahmadinejad regime- as well as all who are sympathetic to these anti-Jewish elements) he penned an open letter to President Bush stating: "Please remember that the maps on Arafat's uniform and in Palestinian children's textbooks show a Palestine encompassing not only all of the West Bank but all of Israel, while Palestinian leaders loudly proclaim that 'Palestine extends from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea, from Rosh Hanikra (in the North) to Rafah (in Gaza). Please remember Danielle Shefi, a little girl in Israel. Danielle was five. When the murderers came, she hid under her bed. Palestinian gunmen found and killed her anyway. Think of all the other victims of terror in the Holy Land. With rare exceptions, the targets were young people, children and families. Please remember that Israel--having lost too many sons and daughters, mothers and fathers--desperately wants peace. It has learned to trust its enemies' threats more than the empty promises of 'neutral' governments".
Elie Wiesel is a true voice of truth and conscience.

disagree with "mediocre" label
I found this a very compelling read, lasting over several readings. It's true the author did not stick tightly to chronological order, but anyone who has read his fiction knows his style tends to be very esoteric and rather free-floating (I personally do not care for his fiction, which I admit I do find to go over my head). However, as a reader, I certainly got a feel for emotions he felt throughout different experiences in his life. I found the last scene describing his emotions before and during his wedding to be really profound. It's true that there is a lot of Jewish content in this book, which may cause some of his analogies etc. to be less accessible to someone from a different background. However, for someone who wants to read a first-hand Holocaust experience without very strong graphic details, I do recommend it. (As a side note, just last week I actually attended a speech by Mr. Wiesel, and he is really a personable, funny, self-effacing and sweet man, not the really sad and somber person you might expect from his writings. I was surprised by this, pleasantly so!)

My own small word
I would strongly recommend that all readers on Amazon read the review whose title caption is ' Remember'. It is far more extensive and far better than the small remarks I am about to post.
Elie Weisel is the one human being who more than any other has helped the world understand the horror of the Shoah , the Holocaust the Nazi destruction of one - third of the Jewish people six million human beings.
For this he should always have a place in the historical consciousness of both the Jewish people and mankind.
His memoir is at times very moving .For those who know his other work and his masterpiece ' Night' there will be much familiar here, though here the story is enriched by greater detail.
I find myself whenever I am reading Weisel unable to really judge in abstract or purely literary terms. His significance as a human being, as a witness as one who has spoken to me in my own life is so great that my feeling is closer to reverence than anything else.
I read this book with the idea that any additional detail about his life and work, any additional understanding of his thought about Man's relation to G-d would be worthwhile. I read this work as I will read all his future works as an admiring student of a great teacher.
May he be blessed by many more years of great creative work.

6 stars?
This is one of the times when I think we should be able to go higher than 5 stars. Elie Wiesel's All Rivers Run to the Sea gave us a more in-depth look to the concentration camp survivor. He really gives us a rich experience in weaving together the threads of his past, from his days in school to the horror in the concentration camps, right up to his days of being a journalist, and ending with him as a groom. You really get a feel for the type of person he is as well - a wonderful, compassionate, and intelligent man. If you've read Night already, you're definitely going to want to check this out. ... Read more

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Customer Reviews (6)

Great Contrast to Night
This book was originally entitled "The Accident" because it involves its main character's 10-week ordeal of attempting to recover after being hit by a taxi cab in New York City. The protagonist, Eliezer,battles death and life for 10 weeks.

Elie Wieseldescribes the protagonist of this novel as the survivor who endured the world's worst war to be so emotionally scarred that he thinks "wouldn't suicide be as great a temptation as love or faith?"In the preface, he mentions how children of WW II were discovered in holes and other hiding places, and whose emancipation was not a moment of magnificence.Rather, their freedom from hiding ensued into a forced starvation and eventual death -as their minds or bodies cared not to live, although offered the opportunity for such.

Pessimism about life abounds. "Maybe God is dead, but man is alive . . . " his friend lectures him. But, he also understands that God must be alive as his grandmother sagely told him "God needs love, not understanding."And, so he tries to believe.

But, such beliefs are accompanied by torments.Like an LSD-plagued person of the 1970's, he is reminded too often of what he endured in the Holocaust to feel free and alive. When recovering, the doctor wants him to fight death - usually something which can be conjured by fear.This survivor, the doctor learns,is afraid of nothing.He has seen too much.A survivor has witnessed more than he wants others to know.Like a military veteran, Wiesel for years said nothing of the hardships - then he began to write about the same. Thank God.

And, while alive the protagonistmust ask why fate has delivered him to life and survival while parents and millions received much less. He surmises that "fate offered him life and maybe happiness."But, the memories continue to haunt him.He glares out almost devoid of connection to present day mind.He does not feel happy.He wants to be lucid.But, "lucidity is fate's victory, not man's."

And, despite his hauntingpast, others had it worse. One is named Sarah-a girl who also survived the Holocaust, but unlike he, she was deprived all concepts of decency and her childhood with one action - sending her into prostitution of the German soldiers who liked 12-year old girls.As a boy of similar age, the protagonist assumingly starved and survived the horror.As a girl, Sarahstarved and survived a most despicable horror.He calls her a saint - to which she retorts with disdain.

Although this novel does not deal directly with the Holocaust, it touches upon how the Holocaust affects lives years, even decades later.

As the healing progresses, he realizes that his life is full of pain.But, "suffering is given to the living, not the dead." Hence, suffering is not a bad thing, it is just something which comes with the gift of life.

Full of great metaphors, esteemed witticisms, and almost-prophetic sayings akin to Asia's Confucius, this book delivers much in its 128 pages.

A book to remember
This book is a must for those who have read Night and Dawn. Night and Dawn were both extremely powerful, but Day truly was the highlight of Wiesel's wonderful trilogy. A must for everyone of all faiths.

The Dawn and Day review
The books Dawn(Second book in trilogy of Night) and Day(Third book in trilogy of Night) are written by Elie Wiesel and they are both about life after the holocaust which was the worst thing that could ever happen in my opinion.

Dawn is the second book in the trilogy Night by Elie Wiesel. Elisha is the main character in this book and he is actually living as a terrorist in British-controlled Palistine. The scary part is that he is ordered to kill an English officer. He can't choose between horrors of the past and dilemmas is the present. You have to read to find out what he does because I don't want to give it away.

The book Day is the last book about the Holocaust by Elie Wiesel and it is a very strong ending to the three books I think. One of the main questions that Elie asks himself throughout the book is "Is it ever possible for Holocaust survivors to create new lives for themselves without remembering their old ones?" and I personaly think that it is a great question to ask yourself because it might be possible to but it is probably really hard to do that if you want to forget your past but remember people in it.

All three of the books should give you an idea of how lucky you are to live in this time period and give you a strong idea of what life used to be like and what life is like for Holocaust survivors now.

Truly Heartfelt
I disagree with the other comments.Of course, this may not be for everyone. It was full of self and ramblings.I, however, felt very much connected to this story.Especially with all its confusion.I think that was the point.He wrote this story so beautifully, I couldn't put it down.

Builds to nothing but it still haunts us after we are done
There is not much to this novel but it's effective when you finish it. When I was done the book i thought what really happend what was the point of the book and I came to a cunclusion it's about life and to see how a memory will haunt you the rest of your life and it show us if we can forgive god and to see if we belive in god. Not much ahppend through out the book I enjoyed the holicost flashback. Overall it's not as good as night and I havent read dawn yet so ic an not say but it's enjoyable. ... Read more

Product Description
Two men wait through the night in British-controlled Palestine for dawn--and for death.One is a captured English officer.The other is Elisha, a young Israeli freedom fighter whose assignment is to kill the officer in reprisal for Britain's execution of a Jewish prisoner.Elisha's past is the nightmare memory of Nazi death camps.He is the only surviving member of his family.His future is a cherished dream of life in the promised homeland.But at daybreak his present will become the tortured reality of a principled man ordered to commit cold-blooded murder.Resonant with feeling, Dawn is an unforgettable journey into the human heart--and an eloquent statement about the moral basis of the new Israel." ... Read more

Customer Reviews (32)

Bitter and non-redemptive, more wooden than "Night"
In "Dawn" Elie Wiesel extends the idea he began in "Night" that life and any positivity lost all meaning for him, and he tries to make up for it here by showing his tortured dilemma of having to execute an enemy soldier in Jerusalem.He ultimately sees the man's humanity but has to, or does, kill him anyway.

The book could have been cut in half, and as such becomes a definite skimmer, with a million-too-many pointless ponderings.

Overall it's an interesting story but not great, as it is not redemptive.It teaches the reader little about the real meaning of life, except to say that it does have a value but that Wiesel still can't find it.

And of course Elie Wiesel never criticizes his family of origin.Although my sense is that they are the ones who really messed him up in the first place, they remain his ideal, and he displaces all his rage and hurt at them onto the Nazis, just as he did in "Night."(And don't get me wrong, I find the Nazis atrocious.)But in "Dawn" his blaming the Nazis becomes more wooden and empty, and at some level even the book's narrator knows it.

The mind of a virgin killer
Elie Wiesel's second book, "Dawn," is a clear improvement over "Night." The former, rather than simply giving a gory firsthand account of history, explores the reasons behind the most terrible act of all - killing. However, this book is still written too tersely for my tastes. The first paragraph, for example, reads:

Somewhere a child began to cry. In the house across the way an old woman closed the shutters. It was hot with all the heat of an autumn evening in Palestine.

Much more interesting is:

The orphan's high-pitched wailing interrupted the sultry autumn evening like a burglar alarm. The airborne scream buzzed like a bumblebee across the way, colliding with the hag's eardrums. She slammed the shutters shut - this was more than she could bear on a muggy Palestinian night. All her life she had managed to eke out a paltry existence on her family's plot of land without complaint. She had never asked for much, only a quiet home in which to tell her grandchildren stories and to do her nighttime knitting...

If Eliezer from "Night" was not pitiable, then Elisha is downright despicable. He lets his superstition rule him (in giving Gad God-like qualities he falls victim to his propaganda), resulting in his suffering.

This book makes a more powerful case against religion than for it - if the terrorists did not believe in their religion, then there would have been no cause for their hatred, and nobody in "Dawn" would have had to die.

In "Dawn," Wiesel again picks a topic that transcends his ability to write.

Dawn
The book dawn is about Elie's life after the war and his stay in the concentration camps. He ends up being drawn to a Palestinian terrorist group. He joins this group and quickly learns their ways and becomes close friends with the leader and others. Elie ends up being told that he must a kill a man named John Dawson because their friend David Mosh was captured and is going to be hung at dawn. The group of Elie's friends and himself stay up until dawn to think about what is going to happen.

I did not enjoy this book as much as I enjoyed the book Night. This book became very confusing at times and lost my interest when certain events would be drawn out for to long. The end of the book was also hard to follow. Another thing I did not like about this book is that a large piece of this book takes place in one room and all the thought revolves around one event that is going to take place. It did catch my attention and seem to be interesting in the first part of the book until it seemed to drag on and it lost my attention. I would recommend this book to anyone who likes complicated and hard to follow books.

Better than "Night"
A wonderful book with great insight into the moral dilemnas of conflict and Israel's fight for independence.

Not Night, But Excellent In Its Own Right
Elie Wiesel's Night is one of the most horrifying, moving accounts of the Holocaust experience that I have read.This book, Dawn, is sometimes referred to as a sequel to Night; however, I think that is misleading.Though readers of Night will see the influence of the author's concentration camp experience reflected in this book, Dawn is something very different.

The most obvious difference, of course, is that Night is nonfiction whereas Dawn is a novel.Dawn tells the story of Elisha, a Holocaust survivor, who is recruited to a terrorist group in Palestine that is trying to drive out the British in the years after World War II.After participating in a number of terrorist activities without remorse, Elisha is assigned to execute a prisoner in retaliation for the execution of one of his comrades.As he waits through the night for his task at dawn, Elisha struggle (literally) with his ghosts.

When faced with an author like Wiesel who has written a classic piece of nonfiction like Night, it is often difficult to judge his fiction fairly.The fiction doesn't seem to have the same impact.And though I, too, prefer Night, I found this book to be powerful in its own right.Dawn gives real insight into how people can be haunted and changed by an unfathomable trauma.In addition, it addresses real philosophical issues such as when does killing become murder and how does becoming a murderer change a person?Does suffering unto death justify a (some might say) disproportionate response?

In these post 9/11 days, I also found the insight into the terrorist mindset very interesting.The American revolutionaries and the Zionists were considered terrorists in their day much as the Palestinians and al Queda are today and, though there are obviously differences between all these groups, there are some attitudes that run through all who can find it in themselves to use terror tactics.It is fascinating to see words come from the mouths of these young Jewish partisans that would fit equally well in the mouths of Palestinians today.

All in all, Dawn is an excellent work: brief but powerful. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Elie Wiesel's story
Elie Wiesel, born in 1928.A Holocaust survivor.Wiesel earned the Nobel Peace Prize in 1986 for his writings about his World War II experiences and his lifelong humanitarian efforts to prevent similar atrocities from occurring anywhere else in the world.In 1944, young Elie and his family were shipped off to a concentration camp in Poland.Wiesel would never see his mother or youngest sister again.Elie and his father were later transported to Buchenwald, a concentration camp in Germany, where his father died of starvation and dysentery just days before the camp was freed by the Allies.

After World War II, Wiesel studied in France and later became a journalist.Ten years after the war, Wiesel told his story in an 800-page manuscript in Yiddish.A condensed, French-language version of his story, was published in 1958, followed by the English translation, "Night", two years later.Night has since been translated into more than thirty languages.An American citizen since 1963, Wiesel lives in New York with his wife & son. ... Read more

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Customer Reviews (10)

Dawn is a good read
Wiesel's Dawn is a heart wrenching book about an Israeli freedom fighter, just about a year after the holocaust, of which the man was involved with, that is forced to execute a British officer.The book is about the previous day, and that night leading up to the execution at dawn.The man is confronted by ghosts of his past telling him that if he kills the man, that he invariably labels everyone he has ever known, or loved as a murderer also.The man has to make the decision whether to execute the man, or let him live. It is a very moving and touching book

Trilogy...backwards!
I have read Night and Dawn, and I am awaiting the arrival of Day. Dawn is ok. I can't possibly say it's bad. It's beautifully written, as all of Wiesel's works, but it is more of a character study than a story. It's an easy read, all three books are, they're very short, but very interesting from a historical standpoint, also. I liked Night so much that Dawn didn't quite satisfy me. I have not yet read Day, also called The Accident, but I have a feeling that it will not compare to Night, just as Dawn fell short for me. Perhaps it is because Night has more events over a longer period of time, whereas Dawn slowly covers the event of one night until dawn. It does become more suspenseful in the final chapter. It was good, however I would recommend reading the "trilogy" backwards.None of these three stories coincide, 2 are fictional. So reading them in a different order would pose no issue in understanding them. Save Night, the best for last. The others will seem much better. :)

Also, Twilight is another by Wiesel that has also been associated with these three books, so perhaps add it?
Dawn, Day, Twilight, NIGHT.
Just save Night for last.

Excellent thinking book & totally different from Night
First off, this is not Night 2.I naively expected that when publisher's try to frame them as part of a 'trilogy'.Night is absolutely and without bar one of the most fantastic books I have read in my life.

This is not just another chapter of that.And it is not a sequel.It is an incredibly profound, and beautifully written meditation on the journey of many Holocaust survivors -- but not his.This is a work of complete fiction. Many survivors went to Palestine, andfought the British (not the Arabs) to kick them out and thus be able to establish a free Jewish state.

It is the story of a fictional Elishah (who has remarkably similar childhood and Holocaust experiences to those of Wiesel) who becomes one of these freedom fighters, and is ordered to execute a British officer in retaliation for their hanging one of the rebels.It is an account of the night that Elishah passes, knowing he has to become a murderer in the morning, and all of his internal struggles with that.In a particularly powerful lead up to the end, he realizes the power of hatred, how without hatred, terrorist groups like theirs, and indeed any violence against others is almost impossible.He notes how nations are so adept at teaching their people to hate, and even comes to the point of trying to make himself hate this stranger in order to be able to follow his orders.

EXTREMELY powerful and evocative.

One word of caution -- there is almost no action here.This is a thinking book.If you are not up to the mental effort to think and feel along with him, you will not like it.

In just one word? Terrorism
A survivor of this becomes a proponent for that. . .by any means necessary. Unfortunately, Ellie Wiesel's fictional "Dawn" is all too true; all too often repeated.
Terrorized as a Jew by Nazis in World War II, Elisha now terrorizes as a Jew for a free Palestine.
Swap out the name of the Holocast survived and the name of the cause proposed and you have the skeleton of all political or religious terrorism. The terrorists will always be with us. . .they usually will win. . .the body count will certainly rise. It will always be the season of terror.

Life and Death Matters
Have you ever had to do something very serious that you did not really want to do? Dawn,is an extraordinary novel written by Elie Wiesel, a surviovor in the Holocaust. Dawn is not in any way connected to Night or Day. Dawn is about responsibility and dity, unlike Night or Day. This novel is about a young boy that has been given the responsibility of executing John Dawson, a British soldier. He holds John hostage and brings him food, I know surprising right? The reason he brings John food is because he does not want John to die with an empty stomach. Later he feels sorrow for John Dawson. What will he do? I would have to say the young boy, main character is my favorite character in Dawn because he changes for the best, I think. This is definitely a novel I would read again because the first time you read it you can not comprehend it very well. I recommend Night, Dawn and Day but I would also recommend it for pleasure read only. You can not do any research on the Holocaust with these three books. I hope you take the time to read them. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (8)

Those Who Knew the Lord
For those familiar with Elie Wiesel only through his Holocaust literature, "Messengers of God" may seem like a departure.It is a book that examines the Biblical portraits and legends of Adam, Moses, Job, and others.To do so, Wiesel uses a mixture of Bible and Torah stories and the rabbinical commentaries (or midrash) to examine the life and legend of each profit.

Wiesel beings with Adam, the first man, examining his relationship with God, before and after the Fall.He naturally follows course to Cain and Abel, an example of the frist genocide as he calls it, and raises some interesting questions concerning the borhters' relationship with each other and with God.He examines the sacrifice of Isaac, Jacob's struggle with the angel, and Joseph's education and purity.The final two portraits are those of Moses, an unlikely leader of the Jews, and Job, a man who would fit in very much with our contemporary time period.For that is exactly what Wiesel tries to accomplish in "Messengers of God": by examining the pasts of these characters he tries to explain how they are still alive in the world today.And for the most part he succeeds.

Each portrait, except the last, is followed by a short section of parables and sayings that illuminate what Jewish scholars have had to say about each of these Biblical figures.Some of these help further Wiesel's purpose, while others seem out of place.Wiesel draws from a variety of sources to paint his portraits and also mixes in his own thoughts and opinions concerning these figures, especially that of Job, whose predicament is easily understood and sympathized with by a Holocaust survivor."Messengers of God" is a quick read, but one that is best deliberated over after each portrait is complete.For anyone looking for a more diverse sketch of these Biblical characters, "Messengers of God" is an excellent place to start.

Messengers of God by Eli Wiesel
Amazon's ease and convenience of purchase and delievery made it a pleasant purchase.The book is a great wry and whimsical analysis of the core Biblical stories.Wiesel delves into both poignant as well as seldom pondered nuances of these oft repeated, but seldomly critiqued and analyzed staples of both Judaic and Christian theology.This book is idylic for any thorough study of liberal arts such as history, sociology, theologhy, and philosophy.

Retelling Biblical stories A most meaningful and beautiful book
Elie Wiesel is alearned and learning Jew, a poetic storyteller whose work is rich in meaning and beauty. In this book he retells the stories of Adam and Eve, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses and Job. His method is to read the Biblical story and the Midrashim and from them retell each Biblical hero's story. The retellings are interpretative and suggestive. He will often raise one set of possibilities and then move on to another. He will often prefer leaving us with a set of questions rather than with a definite answer.
Yet throughout his readings there is a strong feeling of his great love for and devotion to the Biblical text. He reads with respect and a sense of sanctity. He can wonder and protest as he does for instance at Job's acquiescence to God's answer from the Whirlwind but he maintains always a closeness and loving relation to the Tradition.
I read these retellings with very great pleasure. The poetic beauty was one element of this. But another was the sense of searching for and enriching the meaning of stories I myself have since childhood read and reread. I learned much I did not know.
I believe any person who has a feeling for the Bible, or anyone who simply cares for the question of Man's relation to God will benefit greatly from reading this very meaningful and beautiful book.

Through the lens of the Holocaust
In this book, Wiesel tells of seven Bible characters from several different viewpoints: the Bible, the Talmud, Midrash, and his own.The most intriguing of these views is his own because each character is viewed through the lens of the Holocaust.Wiesel identifies with different forms of suffering that each character goes through.Also, the way he portrays God seems to come from an understanding of the Holocaust rather than pre-Holocaust Jewish tradition alone.This book is a definite good read because of the different angles that it attempts to view each character.

Irreverent Fables using Biblical Characters
There should be a warning posted in the front cover of this book.

Warning:The author blames God for everything.Wiesel takes an extremely humanistic viewpoint of God.He portrays God as having doubts and being defeated by Adam's sin.He excuses Adam, and blames Eve for everything, even going so far as to say that Adam didn't know what he was partaking of.He tries to get Adam off the hook by saying God set him up to fail.

In one analysis of the story of Cain and Abel, he feels pity for Cain and blames Abel (pg 56) for the crime.At other points, he makes excuses for Cain, as if he was an innocent victim manipulated and picked on by God.Wiesel states that Cain is not responsible and had not done anything wrong.Meanwhile he missed the entire point that God was not pleased with Cain's offering because Cain was "doing it his own way", not God's way.He was offering fruit of the cursed earth, rather than a lamb, which points to the Lamb of God.We must do things God's way, not our own way.But Wiesel does not understand, instead he blames God, blames Abel and excuses Cain.

And sure enough, he sympathizes with Esau's plight, without realizing that Esau thought of his birthright at such low esteem that he sold it for a bowl of beans.Sure, Jacob shouldn't have tricked his father, but then his father shouldn't have gone against God's stated will of blessing the younger before the elder.God already foreknew that Jacob/Israel would desire the blessings of God and spiritual, and that Esau would reject God, being fleshly and worldly.Hence God is entirely right in choosing who he will bless and who he will set aside.

After meandering through Genesis and the life of Moses, he finally lights on Job, saying "I'm offended by his surrender in the text.Job's resignation as man was an insult to man.He should not have given in so easily.He should have continued to protest."Wiesel missed the entire spiritual application here.Job did not sin with his lips, Job submitted to God's plan, and Job discovered that he had too much pride, and put his hands over his lips.

40:1 Moreover the LORD answered Job, and said,
40:2 Shall he that contendeth with the Almighty instruct him? he that
reproveth God, let him answer it.
40:3 Then Job answered the LORD, and said,
40:4 Behold, I am vile; what shall I answer thee? I will lay mine hand
upon my mouth.
40:5 Once have I spoken; but I will not answer: yea, twice; but I will
proceed no further.

Wiesel was so disappointed with Job's submission that he wishes that this ending was not in the Bible.He speculates that maybe it was added later, preferring to leave Job suspended in dust and ashes, scraping boils with a potsherd."I prefer to think that the Book's true ending was lost.That Job died without having repented, without having humiliated himself; that he succumbed to his grief an uncompromising and whole man."

Wiesel ends the book with "What remains of Job? ... An example, perhaps."Yes, Job is an example and a good and wise example.But Wiesel sees Job as a personification of man's search for justice and truth, "to transform divine injustice into human justice and compassion."In Wiesel's eyes, humans are above God.Hence the warning label needed.He should follow Job's example instead, because Job is rejoicing that he will see God.I wish Wiesel could repent and have Job's hope and joy.

19:25 For I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the
latter day upon the earth:
19:26 And though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my
flesh shall I see God: ... Read more

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Customer Reviews (22)

Ridiculous!
The book is only like 120 small pages -- read it!Having cliff notes to something like this is stupid -- a) because it is so short to begin with and b) from a practical point of view, anything that you are going to be asked to write based on this book is going to be rather emotional, or at least intense, as the subject is, and getting the facts and dates without FEELING it is not going to help you write a decent essay anyway.You would be lucky to get a D on an essay on this book written on the basis of these notes!

What?!?
OK, 72 pages of cliff notes for a 144 page book?That is absurd!Night is a classic work, filled with vivid metaphor and intensely emotional characters.You could get a third of the way through it in the time it would take to BUY the cliff notes.

Aced the exam
Glad I didn't have to read the book. I hate having to think. I mean, on the topic of "night", imagine looking at the stars and having to imagine all those shapes for yourself? But then you can just get a book of the constellations and all the dots are connected. That's good. But who cares anyway? I'd rather stay inside. And the same with books. But then you have to pass your courses. So this was worth the money.
And I could read it on my computer. It'll be even more convenient when I can get it on my Blackberry. I mean, big fat monitors are as passe as email. But I don't want to be a whiner.

OY!
Forget this Cliff Notes crap! Just read Night. It's a great book and it won't even take you long to read. I wish I could give this Cliff Note book zero stars.

Give me a break.
Just read the book. Its a wonderful book and you can read it over a weekend. You don't need cliff notes. ... Read more

Product Description
From Elie Wiesel, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, comes a magical book that introduces us to the towering figure of Rashi—Rabbi Shlomo Yitzchaki—the great biblical and Talmudic commentator of the Middle Ages.

Wiesel brilliantly evokes the world of medieval European Jewry, a world of profound scholars and closed communities ravaged by outbursts of anti-Semitism and decimated by the Crusades. The incomparable scholar Rashi, whose phrase-by-phrase explication of the oral law has been included in every printing of the Talmud since the fifteenth century, was also a spiritual and religious leader: His perspective, encompassing both the mundane and the profound, is timeless.

Wiesel’s Rashi is a heartbroken witness to the suffering of his people, and through his responses to major religious questions of the day we see still another side of this greatest of all interpreters of the sacred writings.

Both beginners and advanced students of the Bible rely on Rashi’s groundbreaking commentary for simple text explanations and Midrashic interpretations. Wiesel, a descendant of Rashi, proves an incomparable guide who enables us to appreciate both the lucidity of Rashi’s writings and the milieu in which they were formed. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (8)

Disappointing
I looked forward to learning more about Rashi, after seeing his name mentioned numerous times in a variety of books based on Jewish theology.I looked forward to reading more of Elie Wiesel's religious commentary,which I find thought provoking.I was disappointed on both counts.Wikipedia has more information about the life of Rashi.There is nothing in this book that isn't already present in Wiesel's other commentaries.It would have made more sense to publish the manuscript as an essay.I want my money back.

Too Short!
Too short. Not enough material. I expected more. What there was of it was wonderful. With a combination of Rashi and Wiesel it should have been a terrific project. Oh well.
Leshalom Y

Light Introduction to Rashi
I specifically chose this title as an introduction to Rashi, knowing that it would not be a full biography. Having said that, other titles in the series have gone in to more depth about the subject's background and influence (especially if background information is sparse, as with Rashi). Overall I enjoyed it but had to continue on to other books about Rashi to get a better feel for his influence.

Beginners and advanced students of the Bible will relish this explanation of his life and times
Rashi is Rabbi Shlomo Yitzhak - a biblical and Talmudic commentator of the Middle Ages - and this book provides not just a biography of the man but a review of medieval European Jewry where scholars existed in closed communities surrounded by anti-Semitism. Scholar Rashi has been in every printing of the Talmud since the 15th century: beginners and advanced students of the Bible will relish this explanation of his life and times.

Dissappointing
I expected more from Elie Wiesel than an account of Rashi's life and work that anyone can look up on the Encyclopedia Judaica. There isn't much of a storyline and except the first few pages little personal reflection. I don't really know how to describe it. I'm just glad I didn't buy the book but that I got it for free. I've read a lot of the other books in the "Jewish Encounters" series of Nextbook most of them are good to excellent, combining good research with weaving it into an interesting story. This one is a dissappointment.
If you know nothing about Rashi - then this might be a slightly better choice then reading the rather dry scholarly Encyclopedia Judaica - this is why I still give it 3 stars. ... Read more

Product Description

Elie Wiesel has given hundreds of interviews. Yet his fame as a human rights advocate often directs such conversations toward non-literary issues. Indeed, many of Wiesel's questioners barely address the writer's role that has defined him since the 1950s.

Unlike previous volumes in which he speaks with interviewers, Elie Wiesel: Conversations collects interviews which set in relief the writer at work. This book focuses on Wiesel the literary artist instead of Wiesel the Holocaust survivor or the 1986 Nobel Peace Prize laureate.

Beyond highlighting Wiesel's literary significance, these interviews also correct many faulty assumptions about his achievement. Few American readers know that he writes in French, that he has been favorably compared to André Malraux and Albert Camus. Not many realize that the Holocaust has been the subject of only a few of his forty books. Particularly in his nonfiction, Wiesel's scope is wide, addressing Jewish life in all its religious and historical complexity.

Though most of Wiesel's books do not focus on the Holocaust, they are written against the backdrop of what he has come to term "The Event." Always, the presence of Auschwitz can be felt, always the author "lives in the shadows of the flames that once illuminated and blinded him."

These interviews are reminders that the writing life is both solitary and public, interior and social. The writer must venture beyond his study and speak out against the world's traumas and outrages.

Robert Franciosi is an associate professor of English at Grand Valley State University in Allendale, Mich. He is the editor of Good Morning: A Holocaust Memoir. His work has appeared in American Poetry, Contemporary Literature, Modern Jewish Studies, and the William Carlos Williams Review. ... Read more

Product Description
Set in a medieval European village where three itinerant Jewish actors put God on trial to answer for His silence during a pogrom, a powerful drama considers historical and especially post-Holocaust issues surrounding faith. Reprint. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (8)

Who should be on trial?
Even to an agnostic, the idea of putting God on trial seems mad.Perhaps only a survivor of the Holocaust, namely the author and the unnamed Auschwitz inmates that served as the play's inspiration, have the right to call their Creator to judgement.

And so they do.Judges andprosecutors readily step forward, but a defender for God is absent until a shadowy figure volunteers.What follows is intense and thought provoking.

The accusations are fierce, but the defense deftly, but uneasily rebuts by either placing the blame on humans alone, by asserting that the now-dead victims' feelings cannot be brought to court, and lastly, that the mind of God cannot be probed, that man's goal is to love and obey him no matter what.

The last defense is much like what Job encounters.But like Job, the victims of this play are denied any knowledge of why God does or does not do anything - Job is simply stunned into silence by God asserting that his power, knowledge and majesty areinfinitely beyond that of Job and therefore he has no right to question God.Any justification for his suffering is never answered.

Nor does this play answer why the Jews are persecuted.The trial ends without a verdict, but characteristically the surviving Jews refuse to abandon their faith even to save their lives - even though they wanted to hold their God to judgment.

While answering no questions, some very good ones are asked in this play.The weak link of Christian theology is always of reconciling the cruelty of this world, with the idea of a perfect-loving and powerful God in whose image we are suppposed to be created in.

The trial shines a favorable light on those who upheld their faith despite persecution, despite their demands for heavenly justice.But so too for those who couldnot maintain faith when they felt abandoned by God.And as one of the judges in this trial notes, this play is one that will be replayed throughout time - and it is up to each group of players to come up with their own verdict.

In sum, a very thoughtful play.

They made my world better!
The seller has a fun, customer focused demeanor. Their automatically-generated follow up message (from Indaba the emailing robot) made me smile--just like the book I ordered. My book arrived promptly and in the condition stated in the description.

Disturbing
This is a disturbing book that tells a disturbing story.Since other reviewers have done a great job providing a synopsis of the book I will go right to the matter of what I think of it.In many ways I was dissapointed.I would have much rather that Wiesel wrote about the trial that he witnessed in Auschwitz rather than placing it in a Ukrainian villege.However, I think he tried and for some reason could not do it. My personal opinion is that the original trial was too painful. So, the play seems to have been inspired by actual events but goes off in another direction entirely. Or does it?I have trouble deciding.

There are many layers to this play - just like the four levels introduced by Bachya ben Asher for the interpretation of scripture: peshat, or "plain meaning"; derash, or "rabbinic aggadah"; derekh hassekhel, or "philosophical"; and sod, or "kabbalistic." The discerning, or knowledgable, reader will find all those levels present in this work.Wiesel is never an easy writer to read or to understand, and this play is no different.

Judgment at Night
As with all of Elie Wiesel's work, the central premise is to explore the question of Jews and their suffering throughout history."The Trial of God" is an interesting departure from his better-known works, in that it is a drama, a play staged during the Jewish holiday of Purim.Based on events that Wiesel witnessed while in Auschwitz, "The Trial of God" accuses the Creator of the Universe of being guilty of neglect to his chosen people.And even though the trial takes place in the seventeenth century, the modern world is very much alive in the facts and accusations.

The trial takes place in 1649, in a Ukrainian village that has been decimated by a pogrom; only two Jews remain, Berish the innkeeper, and his silenced daughter Hanna.Three traveling minstrels arrive and upset Berish.They want to stage a Purim play for all the Jews in the village, without knowing about the devastation of the recent raids.Berish allows them to enact a play as long as he can choose the subject matter; he wishes for a trial to condemn God over what has happened to the Jews and he will serve as prosecutor.The minstrels accept, but can find no one to play the defense attorney for God, until a stranger (who seems to be known by all) arrives to defend God and his actions (or inaction).

Much of the course of the play is devoted to setting up the trial (which doesn't begin until Act Three).Until that time, the reader learns much about the history of Berish and what he witnessed, as well as what makes him so angry towards God.When the stranger arrives to defend God, he does not allow Berish to use the dead as proof or witnesses for one must only think of the living.Tension mounts throughout the course of the play, thanks to news that a mob is gathering once again to kill the remaining Jews.Finally the trial must be abandoned in order for the men to defend themselves, and the play ends, questions unanswered, no verdict given.

The ending may seem like a disappointment to some readers, but it is the only one that is realistic.As Mendel (the minstrel who acts as head judge) puts it, "The verdict will be announced by someone else, at a later stage.For the trial will continue - without us."For how can humanity cast judgment upon God, upon themselves, when they don't have all the answers?As Wiesel once said, "I do not have any answers, but I have some very good questions."The most important thing is that questions are raised, even when the may go unanswered.It is not for us to explain away and answer the desperate plight of the Jewish people, but it is for us to ask and question and to make sure that what has happened is never forgotten.

Amazing and Insightful
As in all his works, Elie Wiesel shares with his readers in "The Trial of God" the simultaneous pain and hope that he feels when he thinks about the role that God has played in his life. This play--and it's exactly that, a play--is full of banter between the characters, humor, and even sexual innuendo, but it also addresses a very serious issue... one man's conflict with the God that he feels has betrayed him. I am a Christian, but I still truly enjoyed reading this and thinking about my personal relationship with this same God. I would encourage anyone to read this - it's a great purchase! ... Read more

Product Description
In this volume, Nobel Prize-winning author Elie Wiesel retells stories from the hasidic masters. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (10)

Book of interesting thought and wisdom
I haven't read this book yet. It is in line as the next one up. I can only say the book inside and outside flaps and preface seem to hint of a very stimulating and "don't stop reading" feeling. Will re-review after it is read. The book came quickly and in perfect condition. Great job to all concerned.

Souls On Fire
Elie Wiesel conveys the richness of the lives of these Hassidic masters in a compelling way.The stories inspire.

A Hasid on Hasidism
Elie Wiesel comes on his mother's side from a Hasidic family. The Hasidic heritage is something he has carried with him from his early childhood. One of its central aspects is the place given to storytelling as central element in the spiritual life. Wiesel who is one of the great poetic storytellers essentially retells the history of the movement through telling the stories of its leading figures. He begins of course with the great founder , the Baal Shem Tov, whose history is bound up with mystery and legend. He relates the story of the greats of the movement. One of his favorite figures is the Berditchever, Levi Yitzhak of Berditchev who was the great defender of the Jewish people. The love of Israel which the Berditcher exemplified involved his relating to God in a deeply personal way. He asked God time and again why Israel was being persecuted when this people, in Levi Berditchev's eyes were righteous. He may get angry with God, shout at Him or grow silent with Him but always maintains a relationship with God. This position is very much like the one Elie Wiesel adopts in the wake of the Shoah.
Wiesel retells the stories of the great teachers of the movement in a devout and yet passionate way. He gives too the very special character and feeling of each of the great Hasidism. He is honest and moving, and this work constitues yet another of those treasured books of Jewish learning and life which he has given to the world.

Very personal
Wiesel managed to capture the essence of Hasidim in his re-telling of their tales - extremely personal, intimate relationship with the Divine. I enjoyed reading and re-reading this book over the years.

Disappointed
I was disappointed with this work. It is more about Elie Weisel then about chassidic stories. Many of the stories are familiar to me, and in all cases they appear distorted and many times the point of the story is missing. To summarize, as one of the stories said, He didn't hear what was said, and didn't write what he heard. ... Read more

Product Description

With this Passover Haggadah, Elie Wiesel and his friend Mark Podwal invite you to join them for the Passover Seder -- the most festive event of the Jewish calendar. Read each year at the Seder table, the Haggadah recounts the miraculous tale of the liberation of the Children of Israel from slavery in Egypt, with a celebration of prayer, ritual, and song. Wiesel and Podwal guide you through the Haggadah and share their understanding and faith in a special illustrated edition that will be treasured for years to come.

Accompanying the traditional Haggadah text (which appears here in an accessible new translation) are Elie Wiesel's poetic interpretations, reminiscences, and instructive retellings of ancient legends. The Nobel laureate interweaves past and present as the symbolism of the Seder is explored. Wiesel's commentaries may be read aloud in their entirety or selected passages may be read each year to illuminate the timeless message of this beloved book of redemption.

This volume is enhanced by more than fifty original drawings by Mark Podwal, the artist whom Cynthia Ozick has called a "genius of metaphor through line." Podwal's work not only complements the traditional Haggadah text, as well as Wiesel's poetic voice, but also serves as commentary unto itself. The drawings, with their fresh juxtapositions of insight and revelation, are an innovative contribution to the long tradition of Haggadah illustration.Amazon.com Review
A Passover Haggadah, retelling the Exodus of the Children of Israel from Egypt, guides families every year through their Passover Seder. A Passover Haggadah faithfully renders the entire text of story, prayer, and song,with commentary by Elie Wiesel. Expertly interwoven, Wiesel's commentary (recalling memories of his own boyhood Seders and reflecting on Israel's place in the modern world) may be read aloud, along with the traditional text, in whole or in part. Drawings by Mark Powdal add joyous, fearsome, and poignant moments to the reader's experience throughout. At the beginning, just before the recitation of the Kiddush, one illustration depicts a contemporary Seder table whose length stretches into a path crossing a huge picture of the desert of ancient Egypt. The scene in the book is the beginning of the journey, the table is the destination, and, with this beautiful Haggadah, the story continues among us. --Michael Joseph Gross ... Read more

Customer Reviews (4)

thoughtful, insightful and easy to follow
Just what i wanted.this Haggadah follows the complete seder but instead of the usual formal blather, it provides thoughtful historical insight.both Jews and non-Jews at our seder found its content enlightening.i'll buy more for next year.

This has become my favorite Haggadah
I'm not sure what to say other than that the one piece of Judaica I do collect is Haggadot.

This commentary has by far become my favorite. It's the voice of a wise person who loves the tradition yet isn't unwilling to question it, who lived through a faith-destroying event, yet retains fondness and love for the holiday and tradition. It's life affirming and tragic and sad and hopeful and innovative all at once.

It isn't the most religious commentary, but for most modern Jews, it could easily be the most moving. Many places can bring you to tears...from the tragedy, the beauty, the hope, and the magic of the holiday.

Includes classic stories for your seder table
Nobel laureate Elie Wiesel tells tales, his wife provides translations, and Dr Podwal includes his magical drawings.Wiesel's commentaries are printed in red (for example, for the Four Sons, he comments on the idea of Four Generations and the transmittal of heritage from knowing (wise) to not-knowing(cant even ask the question)).The classic Hebrew and English text of the traditional haggadah are in black ink. The Haggadah is in Right to Left format.While in English and Hebrew, there are no transliterations.

a passover haggadah
fantastic! a true eye opener! a cute book with really neat and fun information! this book will explain a lot about tradition and passover! ... Read more