Night

Elie Wiesel was a Jewish boy living during the time of the Holocaust. He wrote a book on his experiences and his losses during that tragic time. In Night by Elie Wiesel, the setting and the characters create a mood of disbelief.

The setting of a story almost always determines the mood. This is definitely the case in Elie’s story. The description of the cattle cars the families were transported in almost seems surreal. There were no bathrooms and there was no food or water distributed. People were forced to live in their own waste for those horrible days on the train. Another example would be the crematories. Just the thought of people being thrown into those alive, is ghastly.

The characters also have their own way of setting the mood. Throughout the story, Elie was in a constant state of disbelief. He found it extremely difficult to understand why the Germans were doing that to him, and the millions of other people around him. Mr. Wiesel, Elie’s father, also took it very hard. He constantly encouraged Elie to think about the positives, even though he was never able to stop thinking of the atrociousness around him.

The amount of self confidence and strength these people had to be able to