Unit 2: Suffering's Meaning

Summary and Purpose of Unit

This unit introduces students to the foundational skills of literary analysis through powerful memoirs that reflect on trauma, survival, and human resilience. Through close reading of Night by Elie Wiesel, students will explore how individuals process and convey lived experiences shaped by historical atrocities. 

The unit emphasizes building an academic tone in both discussion and writing, with a strong focus on using textual evidence effectively. Students will deepen their understanding of key literary devices such as symbolism, tone, and imagery while connecting these tools to psychological concepts like memory, survival responses, and the long-term effects of trauma. Academic habits including reading logs, annotations, and research tracking will be reinforced to support independent engagement and critical thinking.

Learning Objectives

• Analyze memoirs using a psychological lens, with attention to trauma, memory, and identity.

• Develop and apply academic vocabulary, tone, and structure in both written and verbal responses.

• Identify and interpret literary devices such as symbolism, tone, and imagery to support textual analysis.

Key Graded Assignments

Reading Log: Ongoing reflective journal with emphasis on personal insights, literary devices, and connections to psychological themes.

First Timed-Writing Exam: An in-class, evidence-based essay assessing students’ ability to analyze text, use academic tone, and organize ideas effectively.

Short Response Exam: Emphasizing the rhetorical perspective of 'Historian as Storyteller.' Students will be questioned on Herodotus's and Zinn's ideas, as well as key theme assocated with the retelling and preservation of history

Other

Bearing Witness: A Holocaust Role-Play Exercise

Slide Deck (Link) -- Student Handout (Link)

Holocaust Texts

Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl (Full Text) (Audiobook)

Man's Search for Meaning Reading Log (Link)

Reading Guide (Link)

"This Way for the Gas, Ladies and Gentlemen" by Tadeusz Borowski (Link)

Night by Elie Wiesel (Full Text) (Audiobook)

Night Discussion Targets (Link)

Night Reading Log (Link)

Night Sample Essay (Link)

The House of the Dead by Fyodor Dostoevsky (Full Text) (Audiobook)

Notes from a Dead House Reading Guide (Link)

Auschwitz and After by Charlotte Delbo

Still Alive: A Holocaust Girlhood Remembered by Ruth Kluger

Smoke Over Birkenau by Liana Millu

Auschwitz: True Tales from a Grotesque Land by Sara Nomberg-Przytyk

Come and See (Rated R) (Trailer) (Full Film)

The Pianist (Rated R) (Trailer)

Life is Beautiful (Rated PG) (Trailer)

Schindler's List (Rated R) (Trailer)

Son of Saul (Rated R) (Trailer) (Opening Scene)

The Zone of Interest (Rated R) (Trailer)

Other Texts of Trauma and Survival

Belovéd by Toni Morrison (Full Text)

The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass by Frederick Douglass (Full Text)

Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl by Harriet Jacobs (Full Text)

When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi (Full Text)

Critical Theory Today (4th Edition) by Lois Tyson

 "Everything you wanted to know about critical theory but were afraid to ask" (1-8)

"Psychoanalytic Criticism" (Pages 2-31)

Ancillary Materials

Mr. Tretyak's Holocaust Page with Overview (Link)

Viktor Frankl: Logotherapy and Man's Search for Meaning by Academy of Ideas (Link)

Finding Something to Live and Die For | The Philosophy of Viktor Frankl (Link)

Viktor Frankl: Self-Actualization is not the goal (Link)

Elie Wiesel - The Perils of Indifference (Link)

Auschwitz with Nobel Laureate and Holocaust Survivor Elie Wiesel | The Oprah Winfrey Show (Link)

"On Compassion" by Barbara Lazear Ascher (Link)

Modern Parallels

20 Days In Mariupol (trailer) (Link)

Task and Purpose on Ukraine Frontline (Link 1; Link 2)

Mr. Nobody Against Putin (trailer) (Link)

"The Israel-Palestine conflict: a brief, simple history" by Vox (Link)

"How much of Gaza has Israel Destroyed?" The Economist (Link)