“Because we also are broken, conquered: even if we know how to adapt ourselves, even if we have finally learnt how to find our food and to resist the fatigue and cold, even if we return home.(150)”
The German’s conquered the Prisoners, and the prisoners know it. Primo may have survived Auschwitz, but he was defeated. By defeated I am not referring to death, but spirit. The quote stats that they is more to not being broken then just adapting and living. To stand up against problems requires more. To fully comprehend this will require experience in a concentration camp, and since I hope none can say, “been there, done that” this will not be an easy topic. Maybe it has to do with faith. Before all they had to do was follow orders, steal and some other things. But now they’ve been given a choice, they have been given the choice to try and escape. They have been broken, because they can longer try to fight back. The prisoners have been lowered to the bottom, not physically, but spiritually. Even if they had the choice, Primo and the others are dead. There is no will left to stand up for what they believe in, even if the had the choice to. There is no will left to change things, they have no will to oppose power. The people in the camp were broken down and conquered. But people also have a miraculous way of getting up when they are down. Just in the next chapter we see more humanity returning to them. What makes a lot of these prisoners unique is that they were conquered, but they didn’t let that fact get in their way of fixing themselves.
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