Night – Elie Wiesel

This Holocaust memoir must have been astounding when it first came out in the 1950s. The graphic description of life and death inside the camps is extremely painful, never moreso than when the boy narrator is casually separated from his mother and sister, never to see them again. The writing is impeccably restrained and often honest to the extent of being uncomfortable.

It seems taboo to ask, but is it possible that the impact of such works has diminished over time? Does familiarity breed not contempt but a kind of numbed acknowledgement of horror?