Death... Death is cold, death has no hair and only eyes. Death saves people, and kills others. Death changes people, morphs them into monsters that they wish not to become, or saves their souls from the devils. God is not death, death is cold. God has no eyes, therefore he is not death.
Though this book has taken many wild turns in the telling of its history, I still don't think that it compared to The DaVinci Code by Dan Brown. I think that it was easy for Dan Brown to write all that he wrote because he probably had a great map of what he wanted to write, and the exact pages he wanted each section to be; whereas Elie Wiesel probably just took his life experiences and wrote in detail about them. Dawn is filled with hate, disgust, and hopes of murder. Hopes of murder because Joab wishes he were dead: "'He imagines he's dead'" (Wiesel 32). Hope in death? "'Funny, isn't it?' he said. 'Death actually saved my life'" (Wiesel 32).
In reading, I the woman "Ilana" is often mentioned, and I wonder who she is. Though the book has claimed she is a mysterious, dark, and insightful women; who can be trusted in these dark times? Why hide ones identity from an entire society when one is worshiped over the radio? '"The English have no description of me; they only know only my voice'" (Wiesel 33). It is her story that stands out from the rest of the "death" stories: when she had a head cold, she was taken in for questioning by the police in accord to if she was the woman's voice from her broadcast of the Voice of Freedom. Death didn't save her life, but a head cold did.
This section of Dawn was very interesting because I got to look into more of the characters pasts. First was Joab who said, “Death saved my life” (Wiesel 31) and I just couldn’t think of a story where death could save life. After listening to the story I was glad and mystified to hear that he had acted dead so he would seem insane and stay at an insane asylum. Next was Gideon who claimed that God had saved him and I was interested too hear what this story might be. Gideon said that he focused on God while he was being tortured and was finally released for lack of evidence. We then got to learn more about Ilana who was apparently saved by having a cold. This was because she did not sound like a radio host when sick and she was not taken to be questioned. Gad Said that he owed his life to three Englishmen which would be ironic considering that he has been killing Englishmen. Gad would have killed himself if the Englishmen refused to draw straws to see who would die. Finally it was Elisha’s turn who said that he owed his life to a laugh. He was being choked by an SS guard when the guard suddenly started laughing and let go, so that Elisha could run away.
ReplyDeleteI really liked the way that Elie Wiesel organized this section where people are tense because of the waiting for David Ben Moshe to die. He gave each of the characters a small intro to tell us what they were saved by. Each of these intro’s was very strange when heard alone and then later he told the story that would explain the strange ways to be saved.
I think that Elie Wiesel again did a great job of portraying a character who was about to become an executioner. He did this by showing Elisha’s anger and how much he was going to win an argument that nobody was going to argue. It shows how much Elisha doesn’t want to kill John Dawson. He is too scared and horrified because of his morals. He also showed how much Elisha wanted John Dawson to know of his own execution.