The Worlds of Elie Wiesel: An Overview of His Career and His Major Themes

215 Pages·2001·1.669 MB·English

by  Jack Kolbert

The Worlds
of Elie Wiesel:
An Overview
of His Career and His
Major Themes
Jack Kolbert

Associated University Presses
The Worlds

of Elie Wiesel
blank verso
The Worlds

of Elie Wiesel

An Overview
of His Career
and His Major Themes
Jack Kolbert
Selinsgrove: Susquehanna University Press
London: Associated University Press
 2001 by Associated University Press, Inc.
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Associated University Presses
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Associated University Presses
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The paper used in this publication meets the requirements of the American
National Standard for Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials
Z39.48-1984.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Kolbert, Jack, 1927–
The worlds of Elie Wiesel / Jack Kolbert.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 1-57591-050-0 (alk. paper)

1. Wiesel, Elie, 1928– 2. Holocaust, Jewish (1939–1945) 3. Authors, French—
20th century—Biography. 4. Jewish authors—Biography. 5. Holocaust
survivors—Biography. I. Title.
PQ2683.I32 Z695 2001

813′.54—dc21

[B] 00-063726
printed in the united states of america
To my first pupil, my sister Esther.
The pupil was three; the
teacher was eight.
and
To my beloved Ruth—with thanks.
Si j’e´cris, c’est parce que je ne peux pas faire autrement, ni
autre chose. (If I write, it is because I cannot do otherwise, nor
any other thing.)
—Elie Wiesel, Tous les fleuves vont a` la
mer: Me´moires, Vol. I.
Contents
Preface 9

Acknowledgments 15

1. Elie Wiesel—A Life and a Career 19

2. Yearning for Childhood: Sighet 50

3. Remembering the Holocaust 59

4. “Indifference to Evil Is Evil” 72

5. The Rhetoric of Silence 80

6. In Remembrance of History 86

7. And Where Was God? 94

8. Hear Oh Israel: The Jewish People Are One 106

9. In Search of Jewish-Christian Dialogue 124

10. The Sanctity of Life 136

11. What Is Literature? 143

12. A Portrait of the Writer as Teacher and Scholar 163

13. The French Connection 172

14. And Yet—A Conclusion That Does Not Conclude 188

Notes 197

Select Bibliography 207

Index 211

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blank verso
Preface
W
hy yet another book on Elie Wiesel? After all, an impres­
sive number of book-length volumes on him have already been pub­
lished during the years following his initial appearance on the inter­
national literary stage. During the last three years alone Wiesel
completed his two-volume memoirs: Tous les fleuves vont a` la mer and Et
la mer n’est pas remplie (the first of these translated into English as
Memoirs: All Rivers Run to the Sea; the second volume [And the Sea Is
Never Full] in an English translation has just appeared. Also, during
the last three years we have seen the publication of Philippe-Michae¨l
de Saint Cheron’s biography of Wiesel and an edited collection of
proceedings at an international Wiesel colloquium held during the
summer of 1995 at the cultural center in the Chateau de Cerisy-la-
Salle, near Saint-Loˆ in Normandy. In honor of the writer’s seventieth
birthday, at least two other festschrifts were published in France and
America. I must also mention other recent and well-researched
monographs like Simon B. Sibelman’s Silence in the Novels of Elie Wiesel
and Colin Davis’s Elie Wiesel’s Secretive Texts. A few months ago, in his
new book, Great Souls Who Changed the Century, David Aikman classi­
fied Elie Wiesel as one of the six “great souls” who transformed
spiritual and moral life during the twentieth century, along with Billy
Graham, Nelson Mandela, Solzhenitsyn, Mother Theresa, and Pope
John Paul II. Aikman states that Wiesel “forced people to look more
closely at the nature of human evil.” Given Wiesel’s prominence as a
writer and as a force for exalted human values, I believe that there
will always be room for yet another book on his thoughts, words, and
visions. Wiesel is a writer who will continue to inspire others to write
about his texts. No voice more eloquently than his defined the full
scope of the Holocaust, arguably the greatest tragedy in history.
My main reason for wanting to write this book on Wiesel stems
from the fact that I have derived much personal satisfaction, both
from my readings of his literature and from my close association with
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