Reality Vs. Realism

       As a freshman in high school, I read Night by Elie Wiesel, which is a personal, firsthand account of the Holocaust. Personally, I'm not sure that I could have had the courage to recount my memories of something so horrific if I were Wiesel. He makes his experiences come to life through a style of writing that is poignant even in its simplicity and its bare facts of that dark time in his life and so many others'. The way he describes Auschwitz, the concentration camp, and the gas room and furnace, the way so many men, women, and children, even elderly people were led to their deaths, sometimes unknowingly, is so real. As I read of the open-pit furnaces where the Nazis were burning babies by the truckload, my heart cried, because when you try to think about this level of inhumanity and depravity, your mind simply cannot fathom such a thing. By the time I reached the end of the novel, I was so depressed yet moved, feeling so extremely blessed to have been born in this time and my particular circumstance of living. The raw, unbarred emotions of Wiesel's account was, in one word, heart-breaking. The unfathomable occurrences in the novel and his moving sense of analyzing the horrors around him make his experience "real" for me. Not only are the facts, for the most part (he probably had to change some names or places sometimes to protect some people), true and authentic, but Eliezer becomes a living person, not just someone you're reading about in a novel. Wiesel tells this story from his perspective, and I don't believe that anyone but someone who has experienced tragedy like this at this level could write in such a realistic, truthful, raw way. Wiesel conveyed his feelings, what he saw, what he experienced in extreme detail, and to say that the novel "tugged on my heartstrings" is quite an understatement. I experienced disgust and hate and fear at such an intense level, I was sort of breathless by the last page. I questioned humanity, our ability to love and fear, etc. and that is what hit home because I thought I understood the principles of humanity and society, but in truth, I never questioned it until then. It made me more observant and considerately more sensitive to my peers and the society I live in, and I don't regret gaining that sense of clarity. 

-Kelsey