V. Nesfield and P. Smith, "The Struggle for Understanding: Elie Wiesel's Literary Works" (SUNY Press, 2019)
An in-depth look at Elie Wiesel\u2019s writings, from his earliest works to his final novels. Elie Wiesel (1928\u20132016) was one of the most important literary voices to emerge from the Holocaust. The Nazis took the lives of most of his family, destroyed the community in which he was raised, and subjected him to ghettoization, imprisonment in Auschwitz and Buchenwald, and a death march. It is remarkable not only that Wiesel survived and found a way to write about his experiences, but that he did so with elegance and profundity. His novels grapple with questions of tradition, memory, trauma, madness, atrocity, and faith. The Struggle for Understanding examines Wiesel\u2019s literary, religious, and cultural roots and the indelible impact of the Holocaust on his storytelling. Grouped in sections on Hasidic origins, the role of the Other, theology and tradition, and later works, the chapters cover the entire span of Wiesel\u2019s career. Books analyzed include the novels\xa0Dawn, The Forgotten, The Gates of the Forest, The Town Beyond the Wall, The Testament, The Time of the Uprooted, The Sonderberg Case, and\xa0Hostage, as well as his memoir,\xa0Night. What emerges is a portrait of Wiesel\u2019s work in its full literary richness.\nVictoria Nesfield is Research Coordinator in the Humanities Research Centre at the University of York, in the United Kingdom. Philip Smith is Professor of English at the Savannah College of Art and Design Hong Kong.\nDr.\xa0Yakir Englander\xa0is the National Director of Leadership programs at the Israeli-American Council. He also teaches at the AJR. He is a Fulbright scholar and was a visiting professor of Religion at Northwestern University, the Shalom Hartman Institute and Harvard Divinity School. His books are Sexuality and the Body in New Religious Zionist Discourse (English/Hebrew and The Male Body in Jewish Lithuanian Ultra-Orthodoxy (Hebrew). He can be reached at:\xa0Yakir1212englander@gmail.com\nLearn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices\nSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/genocide-studies