The major theme in the story A Long Way Gone is that with family and love a person can make it through anything. Overall Ishmael’s story is a very powerful, eye opening read; it informs people on a subject that some know little to nothing about, the civil war in Sierra Leone. Beah uses the theme of family and love, along with the use of symbolism and other literary devices, to inform a larger audience of the issues that he and others had to face while trying to survive in a war zone.
“The saddest sight these days is the imagine of hundreds of children kidnapped and lured into being child soldiers from the age of eight”(Roger Moore).”A Long Way Gone”was written by Ishmael Beah and published in 2007. As horrible and terrifying the experience was for Ishmael Beah starting in Sierra Leone from a young age,he still had enough courage to publish his own memoir.As a kid Ishmael was a happy child that loved music and dance.While performing rap music with his friends away from home his village got attacked by the rebels.Without knowing if his family is alive or not he has to survive on his own going from village to village.He later is forced and brainwashed to become a soldier and under the influence of drugs he became a killing
(need a transition---how does Beah relate to civil war aforementioned—I think I follow and understand but you did not explicitly state, which is always necessary when essay writing) A Long Way Gone is a memoir written and lived by Ishmael Beah. He writes with an intense tone and strong demeanor with his diction,
I have recently read A Long Way Gone by Ishmael Beah, a well written story about his transformation from a young boy to a child soldier. He was taken when he was just a little boy, still enjoying his childhood and forced to fight and murder people. This isn’t the only transformation that I have seen when reading this amazing story. I see his transformation from a child to a soldier and a soldier to a civilized adult, something he struggles with a lot. In this essay, I will be telling you about the transformations I seen while I was reading this novel.
In A Long Way Gone by Ishmael Beah, Beah is an adolescent whose innocence is stripped away at the hands of war. At the age of 13, Beah is forced to fight in the war in order to survive, or give up his battle and die. As a result, Beah ultimately decides to join the war. The harsh violence that Beah is exposed to strips him of his innocence and leaves him helpless and alone with his mind keeping him awake at night trying to unsee the cruelness he has been exposed to. Beah utilizes flashbacks, symbolism, and nature motifs in order to address the loss of his innocence throughout the novel.
A Long Way Gone: War and Rehabilitation Following the life of Ishmael Beah in his autobiography, A Long Way Gone, readers experience how a young boy adjusted to drastic changes in lifestyles. The first- and perhaps more marked- change in lifestyle was when he became a child soldier in the Sierra Leone Army. The second was when he was taken away to be rehabilitated by UNICEF. Although there are several important components in both Ishmael’s life at war and his life during rehabilitation, it is his relationship with fear, how he deals with trauma, and his character in general which significantly share resemblances in each of the two mentioned lifestyles.
Additional Activity 1 In the book, A Long Way Gone by Ishmael Beah, the reader can gather certain information about the story he told. The point of view of his story truly affects the reader’s understanding. Also, Beah included details that defined his experience and changed his life. He also wrote his memoir with an emotion that drove the story.
The title “A Long Way Gone” can be taken in three different ways. The first being that it could mean his family is away from him, the second is him losing his humanity as a child soldier, and the third is after being saved, and not
The human condition is full of paradoxes and double meanings. We can commit the most shocking and terrible acts, but we can complete the most virtuous and honorable feats. Ishmael Beah describes the appalling and violent behavior he and other children exhibited toward the human life during his time in the Sierra Leonean civil war in his memoir, A Long Way Gone. Beah also details the forgiveness and kindness of complete strangers that helped him become the man that fate meant him to be. Homo sapiens are complex creatures brimming with irony and surprises. Paradoxes are not only shown in A Long Way Gone, but also illustrated in other pieces of literature such as short stories, essays, and articles.
In the book “A Long Way Gone” Ishmael has to overcome his fears and desperation especially when he ends up in villages that dislike little kids because of the assumption that they are rebel soldiers. Sometimes he comes face to face with death like the time when some of the villagers who were suffering the civil war, capture Ishmael and his new accompanied friends they were saying ”We told him we were students and this was a big misunderstanding. The crowds shouted, drown the rebels”(Beah 38). When the village guards found a rap cassette in Ishmael's pocket they played the music and it pleased the chief and so they were excused from execution and as a result they were offered to also stay in the village for how long they wanted. This part in the story paves a path from Ishmael to talk and although that was one of his major obstacles pertaining to his life he succeeded and faced adversity by pleading that they were not rebels but
Symbolism is used to help you not only understand the characters but also helps develop a coherent theme. In the long way gone the symbol used to help explain Ishmael’s struggles comes straight from his own pocket in the form of a beat-up cassette. It follows him along on the journey and with its demise you also see the tragic end of the childhood it has represented.
At the age of 13 till the age of 16 the author, Ishmael Beah, pulls himself through many terrible conflicts in Sierra Leone. The author uses conflict to show his readers the realism of his story. By using conflict in many different ways, it allows readers to gain an understanding of how Ishmael struggles changed his life for worse and for better. By using person vs person, person vs society, person vs self, and person vs nature conflict the author is opening doors allowing readers to get a full understanding of Ishmael 's challenges of a life in war. The most commonly seen conflict in ‘A Long Way Gone’ is person vs society.
Hiba Shaqra A Long Way Gone: Typed Reading Log Key Quote Insightful Comment Discussion Question “Perhaps it was necessary he This quote depicts Ishmael’s first Does Ishmael end up cling to false hopes, since they war experience. A child, clearly using this tactic, this had kept him running away dead, had lain in front of him.
The first time Ishmael was ever touched by war was at age 12. At 13, he was picked by the Government Army and brought to a vicious and brutal world. He woke up everyday with fear of dying. He tried his best to look the toughest and satisfy the rebels by fulfilling their demands. Ishmael took a dose of drugs daily to keep him energized and to keep him awake.
Desire is the need for an object, a feeling or a person. One can have a desire for something that is essential for survival, such as water or food, but desire could be used to harm others or oneself. Through A Long Way Gone by Ishmael Beah, Ishmael’s perspective of desire was altered dramatically. These desires were changed from his surroundings or events that were taking place. In the book, Ishmael was easily manipulated by his desires. As the story progresses, the reader sees that desires become a more important role in Ishmael’s life and it made him from being an innocent child into a bloodthirsty soldier only looking for something to slaughter. From these transitioning desires Ishmael becomes less and less stable, making him easily