1. Read the below except from the Preface written by Elie Wiesel about his memoir Night and then respond to the question that follows.
…The topic of Auschwitz has become part of mainstream culture. There are films, plays, novels, international conferences, exhibitions, annual ceremonies with the participation of the nation’s officialdom. The most striking example is that of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington D.C.; it has received more than twenty-two million visitors since its inauguration in 1993.
This may be because the public knows that the number of survivors is shrinking daily and is fascinated by the idea of sharing memories that will soon be lost. For in the end, it is all about memory, its sources, and its magnitude, and, of course, its consequences.
For the survivor who chooses to testify, it is clear: his duty is to bear witness for the dead and for the living. He has no right to deprive future generations of a past that belongs to our collective memory. To forget would be not only dangerous by offensive; to forget the dead would be akin to killing them a second time.
Sometimes I am asked if I know “the response to Auschwitz”; I answer that not only do I not know it, but that I don’t even know if a tragedy of this magnitude has a response. What I do know is that there is “response” in responsibility. When we speak of this era of evil and darkness, so close and yet so distant, “responsibility” is the key word.
The witness has forced himself to testify. For the youth of today, for the children who will be born tomorrow. He does not want his past to become their future.
In these final thoughts from the preface precluding his memoir Night, Elie Wiesel talks about memories and trying to understand Auschwitz. What are your thoughts about the above excerpt in context with a theme you observed at work in the novel? Write a response of no less than three paragraphs explaining how the above excerpt introduces and supports a theme you identified in the novel. Make sure to use textual evidence from the novel to support your answer. (25 points)