And the Sea Is Never Full: Memoirs, 1969 (review)

Abstract

New York, Alfred A. Knopf, 1999. 429 pp. $30.00. I have lived a few lives, observes Elie Wiesel, in second volume of his memoirs. How these existences interrelate provides a key to understanding thought of this remarkable survivor. Driven by claims of memory, he has devoted his life to bearing witness. Universally known, recipient of Nobel Peace prize and many literary awards, author is indefatigable in his efforts on behalf of Jewish and human rights. In fact, he views two as inextricably bound. For Wiesel, a central figure on stage of contemporary history, universal lessons flow from particular. Paradoxically, however, he remains a very private public figure. Nevertheless, distinguishing between two volumes of his memoirs, Wiesel writes that in volume two, introvert will yield to extrovert. He himself provides a crucial clue to reading his life when he observes, I look for life of boy from Sighet in that of orphan abandoned in Buchenwald. This volume is a veritable cornucopia of Wieseliana. From its pages reader gleans much information about author as writer, human rights activist, and, above all, a figure who is firmly and lovingly rooted in Judaism. Reviewing landscape of his life for past thirty years, Wiesel reflects on issues ranging from politics to piety. Early on, he tells reader he feels obligated to turn my attention to those who have been judging me. His account of Simon Wiesenthal's boorish behavior is especially frank. Wiesel is reviled by extremists on both left and right. Deeply committed to Jewish people, he is accused of being Judeocentric. A staunch supporter of Israel, he is criticized for not living in Jewish State. The French antisemite Jean-Marie Domenach vilely shrieks that certain Jews -- including Wiesel -- are collecting the dividends of Auschwitz for their own reasons. On political level, Wiesel takes his readers into labyrinthine world of United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Council, especially as its members are forced to take a stand on President Reagan's infamous visit to Bitburg, German military cemetery which includes graves of SS. Wiesel vigorously opposes this visit. Unsurprisingly, Patrick Buchanan, a presidential advisor well known for Holocaust denial, contends it is crucial that administration not be viewed as succumbing to Jewish pressure. Not to be outdone, Marshall Breger, a practicing Orthodox Jew and Jewish Affairs advisor to White House, tries to dissuade Wiesel from his opposition. But for author, matter is not politics but a question of good and evil. Receiving Congressional Gold Medal, and with President Reagan in attendance at nationally televised event, Wiesel speaks truth to power. He reminds president, for whom he has high personal regard, that his place is not with murderers, but with victims. In a chapter aptly titled From Sighet to Oslo, Wiesel, two years shy of his sixtieth birthday, describes two honors he receives in 1986. …