We've got your back. With the Tough-O-Meter, you'll know whether to bring extra layers or Swiss army knives as you summit the literary mountain. (10 = Toughest)
(7) Snow Line
Get ready, scholars, because this one's pretty tough. Sure, the subject matter is difficult to read, since it's all about one of the more horrific events in world history. But the writing itself is also going to make you work up quite a mental sweat.
Levi writes in dense prose, with a lot of compound-complex sentences; he routinely uses multiple subordinate clauses, which just stack complexity upon complexity (see what we did there?). This totally makes sense, though, because he's writing about complex ideas that are deeply philosophical and cannot necessarily be expressed in simple sentences.
Did we mention that Google Translate will become your best friend? There's a ton of foreign words and phrases (German, French, and Italian, just to name a few) and Levi doesn't always give you a translation. Never fear, though. We here at Shmoop have included a handy guide to some of the most frequently-used non-English words and phrases. If you haven't visited the glossary in our "Writing Style" section, take a look now.