Long Way Gone Quotes
Baseline Essay: Influence of Beliefs in A Long Way Gone
“It was not easy being a soldier, but we just had to do it. I have been rehabilitated now, so don’t be afraid of me. I am not a soldier anymore; I am a child” (239). The memoir A Long Way Gone follows Ishmael in war-torn Sierra Leone. Ishmael’s hometown is attacked by rebels, leading him to embark on a long journey across the country. His journey comes to a stop when he is indoctrinated as a boy soldier and forced to experience the horrors of war from the perspective of a fighter. His journey ends with rehabilitation and a newfound duty to represent the boy soldiers of Sierra Leone. Throughout Ishmael’s journey his perception of the world shifts analogously with his experiences and overall
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As a soldier, Ishmael’s mental state is severely affected due to the various drugs he is on: “Smoking marijuana and sniffing brown brown, cocaine mixed with gunpowder, which was always spread out on the table, and of course taking more up of the white capsules, as I had become addicted to them” (121). Explanation. The drugs cause harsh side effects such as agitation and erratic decisions that lead Ishmael to view the world differently than he would when sober: “But after several doses of these drugs, all I felt was numbness to everything and so much energy that I couldn’t sleep for weeks.” (148) Not only are boy soldiers affected by drugs, trauma too plays a role. In rehabilitation, many of the boy soldiers don’t know how to interpret the world due to the trauma they have experienced: “Boys sometimes ran out of the hall screaming, “The rebels are coming.” Other times, the younger boys sat by rocks weeping and telling us that the rocks were their dead families. Then there were those instances when we would ambush the staff members, tie them up, and interrogate them about the whereabouts of their squad, where they got their supplies of arms and ammunition, drugs, and food” (175). The trauma from the war sticks with the boys and causes them to have an altered perspective on their
Examples Of Hope In A Long Way Gone By Ishmael Beah
564 Words | 3 PagesA Long Way Gone is Ishmael Beah’s memoir. It retracts all of the tragic events Ishmeal endured while the Sierra Leone civil war occurred. Ishmael was a child who lived an ordinary life until rebels infiltrated his village which left him and others with no choice, but to flee. He was then forced to become a child soldier. This book shows the physical and mental torture Beah had to go through while has was a child soldier.
Analysis Of A Long Way Gone By Ishmael Beah
718 Words | 3 PagesWar is a haunting time that affects all humans in one way or another at some point in their lives, and this is explicitly shown in Ishmael Beah’s memoir A Long Way Gone. This book was written from the point of view of Ishmael himself, whose life experiences are almost unimaginably daunting, telling his story as a child soldier in the Sierra Leone Civil War. The whole candor of the story is surprising, as Beah goes into much detail about some of the horrible things he did whilst fighting, and how this has affected him in his adolescence and adulthood. His purpose for writing is not very clear, as he published it a number of years after the war had already ended officially, which is understandable given the things he went through, which leads
What Is The Theme Of Along Way Gone By Ishmael Beah
888 Words | 4 PagesHe no longer feels as if he has control of his future. Right now he is compelled to do anything possible to survive. Like most children Ishmael is afraid to run away, he decides to join the army. When Ishmael first started off in the war as a solider he felt traumatized, disgusted, and horrified by his experiences. On page 100 Ishmael encounters several dead bodies, it was such a traumatizing experience for him; he felt like he was going to throw up.
Ishmael Beah's Journey In A Long Way Gone
1086 Words | 5 PagesHe starts to think smarter and travel more cautiously. In addition to this, Ishmael also shows he had acquired intelligence when the secret market was under attack, “I was getting furious, but… I knew I couldn’t afford to lose my temper. The result would be death, since I was now a civilian; I knew that” (205). Prior to living in the rehab center, if Ishmael had been put in the same situation, he most certainly would have snapped and joined the massacre, but while staying with his civilized families, he learned to think about the outcome of his actions beforehand, so he holds his temper and hides
Analysis Of A Long Way Gone By Ishmael Beah
832 Words | 4 PagesHe wanted us to not only fully understand what war was all about, but also understand the personal side effects it set on all the soldiers. The physical, the emotional, and the mental side effects that many of us do not take into consideration. Beah wants to show us that war can totally change a man’s foundation. It can twist your views and your rule of judgement; things you never would once ever think of doing now seem okay because of all the repercussions of war. To give you a better understanding of what i mean, after being forced into military combat and put on many different drugs, Ishmael takes place in a throat
Themes Of A Long Way Gone By Ishmael Beah
897 Words | 4 PagesIshmael Beah, recalls his time as an orphaned child soldier, in Sierra leone, in his memoir A long way gone. Amongst those who were moved by the memorable piece of literature, there are those who quarrel with the idea that it is a completely factual account of the events that took place in Sierra Leone and the details regarding the physical wounds he obtained. While some of the claims made against its accuracy made are valid, It does not diminish the merit of the memoir. Beah’s escapade as a child soldier, his rehabilitation and the universal themes contribute to the immense worth of the novel, and allow the reader to walk away enlightened.
Examples Of War In A Long Way Gone By Ishmael Beah
816 Words | 4 PagesIshmael woke up in the middle of the night firing his gun when the lieutenant and corporal “threw water on [his] face and gave [him] a few more of the white capsules” (120). Ishmael has had nightmares before but this is the first time it has happened when he’s a soldier. The white capsules are speed or the proper name for them is methamphetamine. These drugs were given to child soldiers to keep them alert and awake. This causes addiction to speed which is terrible for kids.
A Long Way Gone By Ishmael Beah
691 Words | 3 PagesThis army that he is in becomes totally addicted and brainwashed, they do lots of drugs and believe the only way to avenge their family's deaths is kill the other side. These drugs they used were marijuana, cocaine and “brown brown”, which all “helped them” have the courage they needed to fight in war. Ishmael was a soldier for a while before he was then given to UNICEF, or United Nations Children's Fund, which then brought him to a rehabilitation center. Ishmael has lots of troubles when it comes to recognizing and accepting his past, or being able to conceptualize what the future might look like. He meets a nurse Etser at this rehabilitation center, which allows him to open paths, accept and forgive what he has done within the past, and have a better understanding of his
A Long Way Gone By Ishmael Beah
1264 Words | 6 PagesA village most thought was safe, ended up being where he would be recruited at. Ishmael and his friends got used to this harmful lifestyle surrounded by violence and drugs. After months of fighting for revenge, the lieutenants picked some of the younger boys to be rehabilitated, and they became infuriated. They were forced to grow up and
A Long Way Gone By Ishmael Beah
1513 Words | 7 PagesIn the memoir A Long Way Gone, by Ishmael Beah, Beah writes about his childhood to teen years being an unwilling child soldier in Sierra Leone and living through times of great tragedy and war. Ishmael was born in Sierra Leone in 1980 and he moved to the United States in 1998 where he finished high school at the United Nations International School in New York. Ishmael went to Oberlin College. He is also a member of the Human Rights Watch Children’s Watch Rights Division Advisory Committee. He has spoken in front of the United Nations, the Council on Foreign Relations, the Center for Emerging Threats and Opportunities (CETO), and many other NGO panels on how children are affected by war.
A Long Way Gone Analysis
1110 Words | 5 PagesIshmael has a flashback of his life in the war. In his dream he encounters a body wrapped in white bed sheets, and as he unwraps it he realizes it is his own face he is looking at. He then awakens, sweating and on the ground. He says, “I was afraid to fall asleep, but staying awake also brought back painful memories” (Beah 19). Even being in a different country cannot take away the hell that Ishmael has been through.
Comparison Of The Holocaust And Armenian Genocide
703 Words | 3 PagesIn the book, A Long Way Gone by Ishmael Beah, Ishmael becomes a child soldier at the age of 12 for the governmental team the National Patriotic Front of Liberia, in order to fight the Revolutionary United Front. Ishmael goes from being a regular kid who liked to spend time with his friends
A Long Way Gone Theme Essay
946 Words | 4 PagesThe 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. A Long Way Gone, an autobiographical memoir, written by Ishmael Beah, takes place in Sierra Leone during the time of their civil war.
A Long Way Gone Conflict Analysis
1572 Words | 7 PagesAt 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.
A Long Way Gone Character Analysis
1035 Words | 5 PagesLater, UNICEF came and decided to take Ishmael out of the war and put him in a rehabilitation center. In this part of the novel, the reader can see how his desire for killing has controlled him completely. By fighting and killing rebel members in the rehabilitation center and beating up the guards to force them into doing what the children wants to do, the reader can see that the war has changed their ways of life and thoughts. The army was able to change Ishmael 's desires and from that, he became a deadly
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