10 Questions for Elie Wiesel

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WHERE DO WE START? WHAT DO WE NEED TO FOCUS ON? Two subjects. We should fight hatred. There should be a Biblical commandment: Thou shalt not hate. And then there is indifference. Everyone can fall into this trap. It's so easy to enter into indifference and stay there. An indifferent person remains indifferent unless shaken up. These are the most important subjects in the world.

YOU SOUND HOPEFUL, BUT I KNOW YOU LOVE TO READ AND TEACH ALBERT CAMUS. WHY? MANY PEOPLE SEE HIM AS A DEPRESSING WRITER. To the contrary, I think he is hopeful. If you read The Plague, there is a doctor who does everything he can to save. In the midst of death, there is a human being who sacrifices his days and nights--and maybe risks his life--to save people he'd never met. Camus said, "Where there is no hope, one must invent hope." It is only pessimistic if you stop with the first half of the sentence and just say, There is no hope. Like Camus, even when it seems hopeless, I invent reasons to hope.