Ishmael Beah,who is just a twelve year old young boy, tries to manage a way to survive his way out of war by hopping from one village after another. A story named “A Long Way Gone” written by Ishmael himself where he, his brother, and two friends were to leave their village for safety, but along the way they experienced many violence that is said to be inhumane in society today. Violence is said to be the intention to hurt, damage, or kill someone. These are what Ishmael has faced both physical, psychological, and socially on his way to survival with three other people. From the first time he had experienced violence, it was not just on him, but also on the group of his friends and only brother, Junior. Since, Baeh, Junior, and two other friends were …show more content…
This scene stood out because it showed how strong they actually were, but the more I think about it. That was not the case. They were all traumatized and had no courage to speak of what just happened. Though, I believed this sudden attacked helped Beah for what he is about to experience in the future considering this as “mild”. Another event where Ishmael Beah came across violence was when his only brother, Junior died. “I was scared when the wind blew, shaking the thatched roofs, and I felt as if I were out of my body wandering somewhere”(page 62). Losing someone related to you after trying not to lose yourself to war can be said as heartbreaking. Ishmael described the feeling as if his body was wandering somewhere else meaning he is not himself at the moment because he just lost someone close to him. He feels as though he was too afraid it might happen to him one day too. Another incident where Ishmael has experienced violence is -- “one of the unsettling things about my journey, mentally, physically, and emotionally, was that I wasn’t sure when or where it was going to end. I didn’t know what i was going to do with my life. I felt like I
wanted to get rid of his wife and his jobs. He goes to the forest to escape
A prominent theme in A Long Way Gone is about the loss of innocence from the involvement in the war. A Long Way Gone is the memoir of a young boy, Ishmael Beah, wanders in Sierra Leone who struggles for survival. Hoping to survive, he ended up raiding villages from the rebels and killing everyone. One theme in A long Way Gone is that war give innocent people the lust for revenge, destroys childhood and war became part of their daily life.
No one knows what will happen in his or her life whether it is a trivial family dispute or a civil war. Ishmael Beah and Mariatu Kamara are both child victims of war with extremely different life stories. Both of them are authors who have written about their first-hand experience of the truth of the war in order to voice out to the world to be aware of what is happening. Beah wrote A Long Way Gone while Kamara wrote The Bite of the Mango. However, their autobiographies give different information to their readers because of different points of view. Since the overall story of Ishmael Beah includes many psychological and physical aspects of war, his book is more influential and informative to the world than Kamara’s book.
“Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” is a short story that is about a fifteen year old pretty teenager named Connie, who does not get along with her mother and is irritated by her sister. Her sister can do no wrong in her mother's eyes while she is constantly getting criticized. Connie enjoys listening to music, watching movies, and spends a lot of time going out with her best friend and meeting boys. Until one day, a creepy guy, she had seen out one night shows up in her driveway when her family is out. He introduces himself as Arnold Friend and insists that Connie go for a ride with him and threatens to harm her family if she doesn't. In the story, “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” by Joyce Carol Oates portrays Arnold Friend as a rapist; he creates the climax of the story in which Connie is taken from her home and family, by him through violent means.
Ishmael’s search for revenge ended when he was taken out of the front lines of the war by
The lives of many were altered or ended during the most horrific period of their lives. The Civil War of Sierra Leone was devastating and affected many citizens in various ways. Many lost their lives to the brutal violence while some were mentally traumatized from what they saw and what they did. A Long Way Gone and The Bite of the Mango are two accounts of children who had lived during this time period; they express the hardships and physical trials people endured in Sierra Leone. The characters may have both been victims of the war, but both found different ways to survive.
The loss of a family member can be very painful and it’s hard to overcome. On the one hand it’s best to overcome the pain and forget the loss. On the other hand we try our best to cherish their memory. Sometime the loss of a beloved one can be so painful that we might even see and talk to them even though they aren’t there. We may even convince ourselves that they are still alive. This is the main theme in Bernie Mcgill’s short story “No Angle” from 2011.
This book, A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier by Ishmeal Beah, is an insider
War. It is something that is always there like air. Even though at times it is not seen, it is present and active. Maybe it is in different parts of the world, but it just may be right around the bend. No matter where one is located, fighting bloody battles is one thing always occurring. Little innocent children, their fathers and mothers, and all sorts of relatives are perishing due to the effect of the endless wars. In the book A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier, Ishmael Beah, a young boy of twelve is recruited to become a soldier during the civil war in Sierra Leone. Beah’s village gets attacked by rebels and forces himself to become separated from his family. Food becomes scarce as he and his rap friend wander from villages
Fear is a very powerful emotion. It can overcome someone at any moment and control them. It causes people to make irrational decisions and compels people to do things they never thought they would do ad in extreme situations it forces people to kill. Ishmael Beah was in one of these extreme situations, his childhood was stolen from him the moment war reached his home and ripped him from his loved ones. Fear changes people, and in some cases for the worse. There are four stages of fear; freeze, flight, fright and fight which Ishmael goes through on an intensified level.
This is how he copes with being a soldier, it’s his only power to control anything in his life. Throughout the book, he uses hip-hop music to give him strength but that is taken away from them. After years of surviving the war, UNICEF comes to save and rehabilitate not only Ishmael but many other children. Ishmael’s grandma told him, “We must strive to be like the moon.” He uses this to give him strength because only good things can come from the moon and no one complains about it. Eventually, UNICEF helps him find the only family he has left, an uncle and cousins at the capital who he has never met. While he is living there he gets invited to New York to speak about his story and come up with possible solutions at a United Nations conference. When he arrives back home he finds that the war has struck the capital. He can’t take the risk of becoming a child solider again so he leaves his home again to
A Long Way Gone is a war story but also is a story about hope. In A Long Way Gone by Ishmael Beah is both hopefully and devotional because of the age that he was touched by war.
Ishmael is a teacher that specializes in captivity. Apart from being a gorilla that has been caged most of his life, Ishmael specializes in the concept of humans and
When we push our grief away, it seems to go underground and can affect our lives in many unpredictable ways. Stephen Levine, the well-known author on death and
I finally convince myself that I can not let go of John because I never took the chances I had to tell him that he was special to me. He died earlier than anyone thought he would, and I knew him. This was supposed to happen to other people, but it is happening to me.