100 pages 3 hours read

Elie Wiesel

Night

Nonfiction | Autobiography / Memoir | Adult | Published in 1956

A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.

Introduction

Night

  • Genre: Nonfiction; memoir
  • Originally Published: 1956
  • Reading Level/Interest: Lexile 590L; grades 9-12; college/adult
  • Structure/Length: 9 chapters; approx. 120 pages; approx. 4 hours, 17 minutes on audio
  • Central Concern: This autobiographical account serves as both a record of a young man’s survival in the Auschwitz and Buchenwald concentration camps and a deeply moving reflection on the inhumanity of the Holocaust.
  • Potential Sensitivity Issues: The Holocaust; graphic and brutal descriptions of murder, violence, imprisonment, and physical injury; death of parents and family members

Elie Wiesel, Author

  • Bio: 1928-2016; born in what is now Romania; deported and imprisoned as a teenager to German concentration camps; studied in Paris after the war; became a journalist; served as a speaker and activist for human rights and Holocaust remembrance, awareness, and education with the publication of Night and 40 additional books; was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize (1986), the Presidential Medal of Freedom (1992), and the Congressional Gold Medal (1985); awarded Grand Officer of the Order of the Star of Romania, Legion of Honour; awarded with honorary knighthood by the British government (2006)
  • Other Works: Dawn (1961); Day (1961); A Beggar in Jerusalem (1968); Souls on Fire (1972); Messengers of God (1976); The Forgotten (1992)

CENTRAL THEMES  connected and noted throughout this Teaching Unit: