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S40E1: Elie Wiesel: Soul on Fire | Clip

Elie Wiesel recounts the horrors of the Holocaust in “Night”

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In “Night,” Elie Wiesel recounts a memory of witnessing three victims, one of them a child, being hung to their deaths in public.

TRANSCRIPT

- He brings us to Auschwitz with him.

It is both this specific account of this boy's traumatic experience.

And it's at the same time this kind of eternal mythical account.

- [Elie] I witnessed hangings in the camp.

(pencil scrawling) One day we saw three gallows rearing up in the assembly place.

Three victims in chains.

And one of them, a little servant.

The sad-eyed angel.

To hang a young boy in front of thousands of spectators was no light matter.

The head of the camp read the verdict.

All eyes were on the child.

The three victims mounted together onto the chairs.

The three necks were placed at the same moment within the nooses.

"Long live liberty!"

cried the two adults.

But the child was silent.

At a sign from the head of the camp, the three chairs tipped over.

(chairs rustling) Total silence throughout the camp.

(soft explosive music) The two adults were no longer alive.

(solemn music) But the third rope was still moving.

Being so light, so light, the child was still alive.

(clock ticking) For more than half an hour, he stayed there.

Struggling between life and death.

Dying in slow agony under our eyes.

And behind me I heard, "Where is God now?"

And I heard a voice within me answer him, "He's hanging here on these gallows."

(pen scribbling)