In chapter 1, "The Sunflower" (from Simon Wiesenthal's The Sunflower: On the Possibilities and Limits of Forgiveness), the narrator, Simon (the author), begins reflecting on what Arthur (an old friend) had said to him the night before. Simon, too tired from lack of sleep the night before, had news "from outside" that he overheard.
Simon, a prisoner of the camps, recounts numerous norms from the time of the Holocaust. News, when it comes, tends to be bad. The news that follows tends to be worse. He talks about sleeping in crowded huts, men screaming during their dreams, and vast differences between the men in the camps.
Simon goes on to talk about his friends in the camp, Arthur and Josek. Although friends, Simon questions how Josek can keep his faith in a place like the camp, and Arthur is simply angry with Josek at times, mocking him at others. Simon continues to think about life in the camps. He questions his imprisonment and ponders on Josek's ideas regarding man's destiny to suffer.
One Sunday evening, after a day of work, the men are lying in their bunks. Josek begins to speak about the creation of man. Arthur criticizes Josek's ideologies, questioning if God made the Nazis out of the same tear-soaked earth that other men were made of. They come to the conclusion that "God was on leave."
The next day, Arthur and Simon are talking about the discussion from the previous night, and they come to the conclusion that they live in a world that "God has abandoned." Simon then begins to discuss the differences between him and Arthur. Essentially, Simon believes that Arthur lives in the future, and that Simon lives in the past.
Simon then begins to speak about "registration" and life in the camps. He recalls a time where he and other prisoners are marching, and the line suddenly stops. Wondering why, Simon begins to look around. He sees a military cemetery with sunflowers planted on the graves. Flying around the sunflowers were butterflies. Simon decides that the butterflies were taking messages from one grave to another, and he suddenly envies the dead. Unlike the dead here, Simon will be buried in a mass grave, with no connection to the world or "butterflies to visit his grave." It is here that sunflowers become a special symbol for him.
During his walk, Simon contemplates what it means to be a prisoner in the work camps, what is considered normal, and what is not. He then begins to think about his time working at Eastern Railway. He was in a hospital where many people were being treated for numerous things. Simon sees an SS soldier reaching for something—which happens to be a letter from his mother. Simon hands him the letter, and the man thanks him. The man, Karl, begins to tell him about his life. Karl ends with telling Simon that he must confess his sin to a Jew—that Jew being Simon. Karl did not like what he had become, and given he was on his deathbed, he felt the need to confess. Near the end, Simon sees a sunflower in the man's folded hands.
Essentially, the first chapter of the book is about Simon's coming to terms with his present situation and how he will make it through the trials and tribulations of being in a camp. He finds some solace in the fact that not all of the SS are bad. Like him, some are simply at the mercy of the world around them.
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