In literature, Rebbe,
certain things are true
though they didn’t happen,
while others are not, even
if they did. … Elie
Wiesel, All Rivers Run to
the Sea
By Carolyn Yeager
Part One: When and how was
Un di Velt Hot Gesvign
written?
The question I present to
you, the interested public
is: Was Night, a slender
volume of approximately 120
pages in its final
English-language form,
written by the same person
who wrote its original
source work: the reputed 862
typewritten pages of the
Yiddish-language Un di Velt
Hot Gesvign (And the World
Remained Silent)?
This is an important, though
not crucial question, as to
whether Elie Wiesel is an
imposter. The evidence that
I have uncovered so far is
however, even on this
question, not in his favor.
Naomi Seidman, professor of
Jewish Studies at Graduate
Theological Union, wrote a
controversial article about
Elie Wiesel titled “Elie
Wiesel and the Scandal of
Jewish Rage.” In that
article, she mentions a 1979
essay by Wiesel, “An
Interview Unlike Any Other,”
that contains the following
on page 15:
“So heavy was my anguish
[in 1945] that I made a vow:
not to speak, not to touch
upon the essential for at
least ten years. Long enough
to see clearly. Long enough
to learn to listen to the
voices crying inside my own.
Long enough to regain
possession of my memory.
Long enough to unite the
language of man with the
silence of the dead.”1
Just as an aside, I have to
wonder whether these are
believable thoughts for a 16
year old? And why wouldn’t
his memory be better
immediately, rather than 10
years hence?
In the essay, Wiesel also
explains that his first book
was written “at the
insistence of the French
Catholic writer and Nobel
Laureate Francois Mauriac”
after their first meeting in
May 1955 when Wiesel had
obtained an interview with
the famous writer and the
subject of the Holocaust had
come up. Wiesel told him he
had taken a vow not to speak,
but Mauriac insisted he must
speak. “One year later I
sent him the manuscript of
Night, written under the
seal of memory and silence.”
2
