Dawn Essay Research Paper Dawn by Elie

Dawn Essay, Research Paper

Dawn by Elie Wiesel Chapter 1 Takes place in Palestine.

The narrator knows that he has to kill a man tomorrow. He

doesn?t know who it is but he knows what he has to do. The

man that was going to die was an Englishman. The reason

that he had to kill was because there is a war. Beggar. A

man that taught the narrator the difference between night and

day. Narrator met him while he was at the synagogue. The

man wears black clothes. The narrator met the man when he

was 12 years old. The narrator, as a child admitted to the

beggar that he was definitely afraid of the beggar. ?Night is

purer than day; it is better for thinking and loving and

dreaming.? (4) The man wants to teach the narrator to

distinguish between night and day. The beggar taught the

narrator to look into the dusk and there would be a face that

would appear. Night has a face and day does not. The face

that appears is of a dead person. The night before the

narrator does what he has to do, he looks into the night and

sees his own face. There is going to be an execution at

dawn. All of the executions happened at dawn. The

?Movement? always kept their word. A month earlier there

was one of their fighters that had been on a terrorist

operation. He was hauled in by the police and they found

weapons on him. They hung the man. By law this is what

they were supposed to do. This was the tenth death

sentence by the mandatory power in Palestine. The ?Old

Man? decided that things had gone far enough and now he

was not going to allow the English to rule any longer. The

Old Man ordered that a military officer be kidnapped. They

kidnapped Captain John Dawson who walked alone at

night. (6) This made the country very tense. The English

ordered a 24 hour curfew. They searched every house, and

also arrested hundreds of suspects. Tanks were stationed at

the crossroads, barbed wire barricades at street corners.

They did not find the hostage. The High Commissioner of

Palestine said that the whole country would be held

responsible for the murder of the Captain, if he was in fact

murdered. A few people got in touch with the Old Man and

told him not to go too far. They wanted the man that was

supposed to die, to live. If he died than the Captain would

die. The mother of the Captain demanded that the English

give up the young Jew so that she could have her son back.

The men told her that ?The Jews will never do it.? (8) The

Palestinians would not give up the Captain because it would

show a sign of weakness. The English would not agree to

the pardon because it would show a sign of weakness. It

was announced over radio that the Jew was to be executed

the next day. They said nothing about the Captain but

everyone knew that he would die also. The narrator asked

Gad who was going to kill the Captain who was going to kill

the Captain. He replied ?You are.? It was an order from the

Old Man. To Gad it was not a big deal. The narrator was

amazed by the whole thing. Definite connection to Night.

Foreshadow of events. Not wanting to Kill. But being

ordered. Chapter 2 The narrator?s name is Elisha. Age 18.

?Gad had recruited me for the Movement and brought me to

Palestine. He had made me into a terrorist.? (11) The

narrator was held in Buchenwald, a prison camp during the

World War. The Americans liberated it and then they

offered to send him home. He rejected it because he knew

that his parents were dead and that his house and lands were

under the control of foreign hands. He went to Paris and that

is where he met Gad. He was offered asylum in France. He

wanted to learn the language and go to school. but Gad

came into his life. ?The study of philosophy attracted me

because I wanted to understand the meaning of the events of

which I had been the victim.? (12) ?In the concentration

camp I had cried out in sorrow and anger against God and

also against man, who seemed to have inherited only the

cruelty of his creator.? (12) Gad, one night, knocked on the

narrators door and walked in. The narrator did not have any

acquaintances in Paris. The person at the door said that he

knew everything about him. The narrator compares Gad to

God. ?He said ?I am Gad? in the same way the Jehovah said

?I am that I am.?? (14) Also compared him to Meshulah, the

mysterious messenger of fate to whom nothing is impossible.

(15) ?In the Hassidic legends the messenger is always

portrayed standing…? (16) the man would not sit down. The

struggle of the group was to make their homeland free from

outside intervention. ?This was the first story I had ever

heard in which the Jews were not the ones to be afraid.?

(17) Gad ?Here is the dawn. In our land it is very different.

Here the Dawn is gray; in Palestine it is red like fire.? (19)

?You are listening to the voice of freedom . . .? (20) Was

said by a girl every night on the Movements own radio

station. There were only about 5 people who knew who this

woman was. The narrator and Gad were 2 of them. Gad

and the woman were lovers. The English wanted to get hold

of her identity just as bad as they wanted to know the Old

Man. John and David. People from the bible. The narrator

walks over to look in the mirror. He only sees eyes. He was

told ?Death . . . is a being without arms or legs or mouth or

head; it is all eyes. If you ever meet a creature with eyes

everywhere. You can be sure that it is death.? (22-23) The

story started with a child crying and now as the narrator

begins to sob because of what he has to do, the child stops

crying. Same age group as in Night. Terrorist by choice.

Jews fighting the group of people who helped save them

during the war. Held in prison camp during the war. Parents

died in camps. Stranger comes to door and walks right in.

Both stories have Jews fighting for freedom. Chapter 3 The

narrator believes that he has killed before in raids on camps

and convoys but he did not feel bad about planning the

raids. They were at night. The movements plan was to kill as

many English as possible. That was all. The Captain was

being held at a Professor of Language?s house. This is where

they held prisoners and people wanted by the police. There

was a dungeon built in the basement. When the dogs

searched the house they smelled him and came within inches

of him but there was a wall between them. For the first 6

weeks that the narrator was in Palestine, he was taught how

to use a variety of weapons and how to kill people

effectively with bare hands. And how to escape from any

prison. On the last day of training a masked man came to

talk to them. The narrator believes that it was the old man.

The first time that the narrator killed, he and 4 others raided

a camp where they surrounded a group of soldiers and then

began firing on them. He says that he will never forget that

night. (28) The second time that he killed, he and a group of

men went and set mines on a corner of a road. When 3

trucks came around the corner one of them hit a mine. The

other trucks stopped and the men got out of the back. They

were all killed. When he goes out to kill he calls it ?putting on

the gray colors of the SS.? The woman came home and she

stated the Old Man had been crying. (30) One night they

had an operation where they went onto an army base with

false documents that stated that they were supposed to pick

up Tommy guns and ammunition. They almost got away but

the man at the gate received a message that the order was

not in proper authority. They already had everything loaded

and they clubbed the gate guard over the head. The guard

woke up and started firing at the group. David got shot and

that is when he was captured. The narrator was not there

but Gad was the organizer of the operation and takes blame