Identity Changes in Night by Elie Wiesel Essay Example
We, as a group of individuals all experience a little bump on the road, that ends up being difficult to escape. When we finally escape it, it makes a huge difference impact on our identity. In the novel named ‘Night’ by Elie Wiesel, we are shown Elies Identity drastically changing from when he first arrived at the concentration camp to the very end, when they got released. I believe that experiencing difficult experiences shapes our identity.
At the beginning of the novel, ‘Night’ Elie Wiesel had the mindset of a naive young boy who believed God could help with anything. He even wanted to get more further into religion to follow his father’s exact footsteps. As soon as the concentration camps began to come into view, Elie's faith in god slowly starts to disappear, and he starts questioning God.”I did not fast. First of all, to please my father who had forbidden me to do so. And then, there was no longer any reason for me to fast. I no longer accepted God’s silence. As I swallowed my ration of soup, I turned that act into a symbol of rebellion, or protest against Him.” (Pg.69).In this given quote Elie has an inner conflict with him and God, pondering if he should fast or not. He ended up choosing not to. Elie turned his back against God in hopes of revenge due to the abandonment through difficult times. Through what Elie had sawed and experienced at the concentration camp, rewired the way he thinks about God and the way he responds to situations.
When experiencing tough times, most individuals would put their needs first on their priority list rather than anyone else's, they would do awful actions to survive. An example of this statement would be when the individuals are packed like sardines in the cattle truck to be transported to a different concentration camp, traveling for ten days without food, the only thing in sight was snow. They later start approaching German villages, where German workers start tossing bread into the cattle truck. They watched everything break loose and continued tossing in more bread for their entertainment. In Elie’s eyes, he saw an elderly man get murdered by his son for a ration of bread to survive. In a desperate time, our actions will be changed to survive. The son panicked and chose to attack his father in spite to survive the cattle ride to another concentration camp, his morals have changed from when he first arrived at the concentration camps, to now, when they’re traveling to a different camp. The son facing difficult situations in the concentration completely changed his identity.
I haven't experienced anything worse compared to the holocaust, but a section in my life where an experience shaped my identity was during online learning. Before when Covid was even an issue, I used to extremely struggle with handing in assignments before the deadline, whether it was for English, history, or math. I always thought that this wouldn’t be an issue for the future, I would continue delaying on doing my assignments for any of my classes. As soon as online learning came rolling around making us transfer to online school I struggled a tiny bit due to me not being used to handing in assignments before the deadline. But at the end of this struggling experience for me, it sort of helped me become more responsible. Experiencing this difficult time through online learning changed my identity, and how I respond to deadlines.
As time steps in and out, we all experience a situation really difficult to face that completely changes our identity changes the way we think or respond to different situations. We are shown this through our novel when Elie turns his back against God, by not fasting during their religious holiday, he felt that God had left them abandoned through this rough patch. During the cattle cart ride, the son faced a bunch of terrible issues, that he turned against his dad for a ration of bread. And I as an individual started to approach my schoolwork in a different manner due to my struggle during online learning.
