Chapter 13 "October, 1944," Summary and Analysis

During the events of this chapter, Levi has been imprisoned within Auschwitz for about eight months—he will survive another three months before freedom. The chapter begins with a verb tense shift—occasionally encountered throughout the text but not to the degree exhibited here. The chapter is narrated from the first-person plural point of view in the present tense; whereas, the general text is presented from the first-person singular point of view in the past tense. This shift gives the chapter an immediacy and relevancy not typically found in autobiographical material.

Having survived much of the winter during the early months of 1944, Levi and the other inmates are keenly aware of the horrors and peril of the impending winter, and they view its slow arrival with dread. The hunger and the cold they have experienced...