Additionally, in his two-part autobiography,
All the Rivers Run to the Sea as well as
And The Sea Is Never Full, Wiesel reveals the private man in the context of his times. Wiesel was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1986 for his work on behalf of victims around the world. Accepting the prize, Wiesel reminded the audience that the world cannot remain silent "when human lives are endangered, when human dignity is in jeopardy. . . . Wherever men or women are persecuted because of their race, religion, or political views, that place must--at that moment--become the center of the universe."
From Romania to Auschwitz
In the spring of 1944, the Nazis entered the Transylvanian village of Sighet, Romania, until then a relatively safe and peaceful enclave in the middle of a war-torn continent. Arriving with orders to exterminate an estimated 600,000 Jews in six weeks or less, Adolf Eichmann, chief of the Gestapo's Jewish section, began making arrangements for a mass deportation program. Among those forced to leave their homes was fifteen-year-old Elie Wiesel, the only son of a grocer and his wife. A serious and devoted student of the Talmud and the mystical teachings of Hasidism and the Cabala, the young man had always assumed he would spend his entire life in Sighet, quietly contemplating the religious texts and helping out in the family's store from time to time.
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