Night by Elie Wiesel describes his experiences as a teenager imprisoned in Nazi concentration camps during World War II. The memoir details his separation from family members, harsh conditions, starvation, sickness, and witnessing horrific atrocities and deaths of prisoners. It provides insight into how the young Wiesel struggled to maintain hope and faith in God and humanity despite facing intense suffering and evil.
1. Night, by Elie Wiesel
I. Multiple Choice: Select the best answer for each of the
following.
1.______ Elie Weisel spent his childhood in (a) Sighet; (b) Madrid;
(c) London; (d) Vienna.
2.______ The Jews of Sighet underestimated the approaching
danger because (a) the German soldiers have been
polite and reasonable; (b) the Russian army was
making gigantic strides against the Germans; (c) they
reasoned that it was merely a plot to steal jewelry; (d)
all of the above.
3.______ Who cried “Fire!” I can see fire!”? (a) Elie’s mom;
(b) Madam Schachter; (c) Moshe; (d) Mengele.
4.______ When Elie and his father first arrived at their
destination, they were told not to tell their real ages
because of fear and death. What ages were they told
to use? (a) 14 and 60; (b) 16 and 45; (c) 18 and 45; (d)
18 and 40.
5.______ The prayer for the dead is (a) Sonder-Kommando; (b)
Kaddish; (c) Oberkapo; (d) Cabbala.
6.______ “Men to the left! Women to the right!” were the words
which separate Elie and his (a) Mother; (b) sister; (c)
Mother and sister; (d) grandmother.
7.______ A-7713 represents (a) Mengele; (b) Elie’s father; (c)
Elie; (d) Moshe.
8.______ Why was A-7713 ordered to go to the dentist? (a)
Toothache; (b) removal of a gold crown; (c) he was the
dentist’s assistant; (d) he was sick.
9.______ Elie learned that if he and his father had remained in
Auschwitz hospital (a) they would have been shot with
the other prisoners; (b) they would have been liberated
by the Russians; (c) they would have started to death.
10.______Elie had an operation to (a) drain swelling in his foot;
(b) amputate his foot; (c) remove his gall bladder.
11.______ The men cleaned the block before evacuation in an
attempt to (a) show the liberating army that humans
lived there; (b) search for food; (c) pass inspection.
12.______Which statement is true of Akiba Drumer? (a) friends
forgot to say the Kaddish for him; (b) his faith in God
inspired Elie; (c) he was a much-despised kapo.
2. 13.______Rabbi Eliahou was (a) cremated; (b) left in the hospital;
(c) looking for his son; (d) killed by his son.
14.______Idek was (a) a friend of Elie’s; (b) Juliek’s dad; (c) a
cruel doctor; (d) a kapo in charge of Elie’s barrack.
15.______Who was taken for dead and almost thrown from the
train? (a) Elie’s father; (b) Elie; (c) Moshe; (d) Madame
Schacter.
16.______On what day did Elie’s father die? (a) January 29; (b)
April 20; (c) November 1; (d) December 11.
17.______When the prisoners were liberated, their first act as
free men was (a) revenge on their captor; (b) burning
their barracks; (c) throw themselves on the food and
other provisions; (d) bathing.
18.______When Elie looked at himself in the mirror, he saw a (a)
corpse; (b) vision of his father; (c) a gap where his
crown had been.
19.______Night is (a) fiction; (b) nonfiction; (c) science fiction.
20.______The little French girl that Elie later met in Paris was
actually (a) Jewish; (b) German; (c) Aryan; (d)
American.
21.______Who was not a source of cruelty to Elie or his father?
(a) Idek; (b) the gypsies; (c) the doctor who operated
on Elie.
22.______Madame Schacter’s hallucinations foreshadow (a)
the crematories; (b) Elie’s eventual release; (c) the
enslavement of the Jews.
23.______A Jewish scholar and leader of Jewish congregations
is called a (a) Beadle; (b) Talmud; (c) Kaddish; (d)
Rabbi.
24.______Elie was punished for (a) walking in on Idek with a
young Polish girl; (b) seeing babies killed; (c) stealing
food; (d) running during selection.
25.______As punishment, Elie (a) had his rations taken away; (b)
had his foot amputated; (c) was beaten with a whip; (d)
was given extra work.
II. True/False. Choose True or False and mark your answer
sheet accordingly.
1._______Moshe the Beadle attempts to warn the Jews of
Sighet.
2._______Elie’s father helps him survive Auschwitz.
3._______A synagogue is a Jewish place of worship.
3. 4._______The hanging of the Pipel made little impression on Elie
and the other prisoners.
5._______Elie is eighteen when the story begins.
6._______The dentist removed Elie’s crown with a rusty spoon.
7._______Selections are made to find prisoners in need of
medical care.
8._______Elie’s hospital stay was as miserable as life in the
barrack.
III. Short answer
Put the number in front of each event with a number 1 for
the first event and a number 9 for the last one and numbers
2 through 8 in order of when they happened for those in
between.
1. __________ The Jews of Sighet are herded into a small ghetto.
2.___________The Jews of Sighet are loaded in cattle cars and
are held captive in sealed cattle cars
for three days.
3.___________The Jews smell burning flesh.
4._________Elie decides to commit suicide by throwing himself
onto an electrified barbed wire
fence.
5.__________Elie walks by burning babies in an open pit.
6._________Elie and his father lied about their age to avoid being
sent to the gas chambers.
7._________At Auschwitz Elie is separated from his mother and
sisters whom he never sees again.
8.__________Elie lies to Stein telling him that his wife and children
are safe.
9._________Moshe the Beadle returns to Sighet with the news of
Nazi mass murder of Jews.
B. Put the name of the character by his or her description:
Moshe the Beadle, Elie Wiesel, Chlomo Wiesel, Stein of
Antwerp, Madame Schachter
4. 10. __________________________a 50 year old woman whose
hysterical cries of fire torture the whole cattle car of Jews.
11. ____________________________the father in Night, who is a leader
in the Jewish community
12. ________________________the narrator of the memoir, Night
13. __________________________the one who warns the Jews that
the Nazis want to kill them
14. ________________________________the relative who asks if his
children are still alive
IV. Essay- How were the Jews of Sighet in denial concerning
the Nazi threats against them in Night, by Elie Wiesel? ( 4
paragraph essay using literary terms)
A. Put the number in front of each event with a number 1 for
the first event and a number 10 for the last one and numbers 2
through 9 in order when they happened for those in between.
1. __________ Elie hates himself for not helping his father when he
is beaten .
2.___________Men are given a public hanging but Elie is troubled
just a little.
3.___________The Jews celebrate the Jewish new year.
4._________Ellie's foot is operated on by a Jewish doctor.
5.__________Elie's father gives his son his only possessions, a
knife and a spoon, thinking he will be killed because he was
selected to be gassed.
6._________When a child is hung for assisting with the explosion
of a building and takes a half hour to die, Elie is very troubled.
7._________Elie, to save his father from being beaten constantly,
is forced to let his gold tooth be pulled with a rusty spoon.
8.__________The Buna camp is bombed by the allies.
9._________The violinist from Holland complains that Jews were
not allowed to play Beethoven.
10. _______When the camp called Buna is abandoned because
the Russians are coming the
prisoners are forced to march in the snow,
B.Write the vocabulary work next to the correct definition:
Rosh Hashanah, Zionism, Yom Kippur, Passover, Kaddish,
Beadle, Kapo
11. __________________________a prison guard who is also a prisoner
12. ____________________________a prayer Jews recite in memory of
a loved one who died.
5. 13. ________________________a holiday called the Jewish New Year
14. __________________________a holiday where Jews must fast
15. ________________________________the belief that Jews must once
more become a nation with land of their own in Palestine
16. _______________________________a caretaker in the synagogue
17. ___________________________a Jewish holiday that is celebrated
for eight days each Spring to recall the exodus of Jews from
Egypt where they were held in slavery.
1. After Idek beats Eli, the 3. The hunchback demands
French girl sooths him by that Friedrich
a) putting on bandages a) leave the youth group
b) saying words of b) say the words, "the
encouragement Jews are our affliction"
c) telling Elie she is c) return the ring with the
secretly Jewish Swastika
2. The French girl takes a 4. When Friedrich, who is
risk when she Jewish, is maligned by the
a) pretends she is Aryan hunchback his friend
b) feeds Elie bread a) tries to help him
c) speaks German b) leaves with him
c) does nothing.
Final Exam, part 3 essay: Read "Fifteen," by William Stafford,
below. After answering the short answer questions write a
unified essay. Explain both authors' point of view of a fifteen
year old.
"Fifteen," by William Stafford
South of the Bridge on Seventeenth
I found back of the willows one summer
day a motorcycle with engine running
as it lay on its side, ticking over
slowly in the high grass. I was fifteen.
6. I admired all that pulsing gleam, the
shiny flanks, the demure headlights
fringed here it lay; I led it gently
to the road and stood with that
companion, ready and friendly. I was fifteen.
We could find the end of a road, meet
the sky on out Seventeenth. I thought about
hills, and patting the handle got back a
confident opinion. On the bridge we indulged
a forward feeling, a tremble. I was fifteen.
Thinking, back farther in the grass I found
the owner, just coming to, where he had flipped
over the rail. He had blood on hishand, was pale-
I helped him walk to his machine. He ran his hand
over it, called me good man, roared away.
I stood there, fifteen.
Questions: Circle the letter of the correct answer. There can
be more than one answer circled for
each question.
1. The German workmen who saw the train full of concentration
camp slave laborers usually ignored them until the workmen
a. decided to bring food and water.
b. watched the slave laborers fight over one piece of bread
thrown into the train cars by
one German workman.
c. brought blankets for the slave laborers because it was
snowing and cold.
2. One simile is
a. I noticed an old man dragging himself along on all fours.
b. They had probably never seen a train with such cargo.
c. His eyes gleaned; a smile, like a grimace lit up his dead
face.
7. 3. While on the train car Elie is horrified to see
a. two children engaged in a death struggle over coins
thrown to them.
b. his father killed by other men.
c. a son kill his father for a piece of bread.
4. The irony is that
a. the men who were weak from hunger were not
interested in the bread.
b. the German workers were giving bread to the slave
laborers.
c.The son who killed his father for bread is killed by others
for the bread.
5. The fifteen year old boy sees limitless travel possibilities with
his new friend,
a. the rider
b. a dog
c. the motorcycle
6. Which is not an example of personification is
a. I admired all that pulsing gleam, the shiny flanks, the
demure headlights fringed where
it lay.
b. I thought about the hills, and patting the handle got back
a confident opinion.
c. I helped him walk to his machine
7. Because he is fifteen years old the boy is too young to
a. travel on a train by himself
b. go off on a motorcycle by himself
c. own an expensive machine