The Accident was written by Elie Wiesel. It is about the account of a man named Eliezer who has survived the Holocaust and must live with his painful memories of that horrifying time period.
As the title suggests, the main tragic event in the novel is a car striking Eliezer by accident. While crossing the street in New York, Eliezer is accidentally struck by a vehicle and is dragged for a distance. Eliezer is rushed to the hospital. While unconscious, he undergoes intense treatment. Five days later, Eliezer regains his consciousness.
Due to his experiences during the Holocaust, Eliezer is felt feeling despondent, depressed, and even without purpose in life. So when he realizes that he survived a horrible car accident, he does not really care much, if at all.
Initially, he still has a storm of anger and resentment churning within his soul related to his unresolved feelings about the past. He cannot resolve the moral questions he has—such as how God could let the Nazis perpetrate such evils without consequence, significant resistance, or punishment (in most cases). He also wonders why he was lucky enough to survive, how people could ignore the evils that happened, or how people could question whether or not it really did happen.
The climactic point of the novel, however, appears when Eliezer finally becomes content with the simple fact that he is still alive to tell the story of what happened to him and his fellow Jews in the Holocaust and resolves to educate other people about the evils of the world: to never forget it, so that history does not repeat itself.
He has conquered death and embraced life and purpose through telling his story after the accident, and that in itself is the climax (the resolution of all the plots and subplots, including Eliezer's personal struggles with figuring out the meaning of his own existence). Eliezer in this respect finds it within himself to live and love again, but he still never forgets what happened in the Holocaust.
Monday, December 10, 2012
Describe the point at which The Accident reaches the climax (this is the highest point of interest in the novel after which all plots and subplots are resolved).
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