Along with other Old Wives cures like chicken noodle soup or an adage like ‘an apple a day keeps the doctor away’, sleep is often said to be the best cure for any illness. My parents have often told me during times of stress or anxiety to get a good night’s sleep because I will be able to see things more clearly in the morning. Doctors also often recommend bedrest to patients dealing with illnesses because the body is able to do its best healing during sleep. Elie and the other prisoners also felt this rejuvenating power only once in their time at the camp. “Our morale was much improved. A good night’s sleep had done its work” (p. 42, T, L). While they were not able to get many more nights like this again, this one night probably helped some of these men and women regain the strength they needed to survive the oncoming onslaught of terror and torture that awaited them in the months to …show more content…
For some, night is a time of rest and relaxation. For others, like college students, night is often a time for partying or for doing a marathon study session. Night can also be a period of time in which a person is able to truly reflect on life and discover who they are in this world. Many nights are spent without sleep, wondering what it truly means to be in this event we call the human experience. The latter is true for Elie at the beginning of his novel as he is starting his new relationship with Moishe. Elie utilized his extra time at night to reflect upon his faith and the reasons for his passion. He was alone with himself and God, an atmosphere that is conducive to delving deep within the soul and learning information about oneself that could not have been found otherwise. Elie’s reflection is a foreshadowing of the many nights he would spend in the camps wondering whether or not the religion and the God he had been so devoted to were real, even though only a few months had