![]() During this time Eliezer doesn't care about anything except feeding himself, and he probably isn't monitoring the war outside all that closely and just wants to get out of the concentration camp. For example, he fails to explain what the camp resistance organization is, and he does not tell us exactly how close to defeat the Germans are. In the last few pages of the novel, Wiesel leaves out some historical background that would make the narrative clearer. His story of life at Auschwitz and Buna has been one in which he and his father struggled together to survive, and after he dies, details become irrelevant. After my father's death, nothing could touch me any more." The narrative ends rather abruptly after his father dies because to Eliezer, there is really no more story to tell. ![]() For after his father's death, Eliezer's life in the concentration camp also ceases to really exist: "I have nothing to say of my life during this period. Though Eliezer feels relieved when his father dies, it is clear that this emotion is merely a momentary one that he later deeply regrets. When he looks at himself, he sees the eyes of a corpse, and that image has never left him. He had not seen his reflection since living in the ghetto. After he got a little bit better, he gathered enough strength to look at himself in the mirror. Three days after Buchenwald was liberated, Eliezer became deathly ill with food poisoning and spent two weeks in the hospital. The first thing the newly-freed prisoners thought of was food. At six in the evening, the first American tank arrives at Buchenwald. The SS flees, and resistance takes charge of the camp. The next morning the resistance movement suddenly battles the SS in the assembly place. A siren alert occurs, however, and the evacuation is postponed to the next day. On April 10, the remaining 20,000 prisoners are to be evacuated and the camp blown up. ![]() Ten blocks of deportees would be evacuated each day, and no more food would be distributed. On the way back, they learn that "the camp resistance organization had decided not to abandon the Jews and was going to prevent their being liquidated." The next day there is a roll call, and the head of Buchenwald announces that the camp is to be liquidated. The children start to go to, but prisoners tell them to go back to their blocks, warning them that the Germans are going to shoot everyone. After two hours, an announcement goes out that all Jews must go to the assembly place. On April 5, the SS guard is late to roll call, and everyone knows something must have happened. He is transferred to the children's block. He has nothing to say of these last months in the concentration camps because after his father's death, he became indifferent and emotionless, concerned only with eating. Eliezer remains at Buchenwald until April 11.
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