A Long Way Gone by Ishmael

Theme 2 - Survival

A Long Way Gone by Ishmael Beah

When I was very little, my father used to say, "If you are alive, there is hope for a better day and something good to happen. If there is nothing good left in the destiny of a person, he or she will die. I thought about these words during my journey, they kept me moving even when I didn't know where I was going. Those words became the vehicle that drove my spirit forward and made it stay alive" (Beah 54).

Summary

This book is about Ishmael Beah life as a child soldier in Sierra Leone during the Civil War. When he is twelve years old, Beah's village and goes in search of food, his parents, and shelter. Eventually, Ishmael becomes a soldier for the army. The army becomes his family and he is brainwashed into believing that each rebel death may avenge his own family's deaths. The boy soldiers become addicted to drugs and watch war movies which give them the courage to fight. Ishmael fights for two years until his Lieutenant turns the boy soldiers over to UNICEF. Ishmael is taken to a rehabilitation center, where he struggles to understand his past and to find a future. At Rehab people believe in Ishmael and he finds out has extended family in Freetown. Ishmael is invited along with other children of war to New York City to tell his story to the United Nations. After his uncle's death, Ishmael leaves Sierra Leone for neighboring Guinea and eventually makes his way to his new life in the United States.

Analysis

Analysis

Ishmael Beah is still haunted by nightmares of his time fighting the war in Sierra Leone. His new life is unfamiliar to him. His dreams bring him back to his horrible life in Sierra Leone as a victim of the RUF violence. He is a young man divided against himself.

Project By - Jason Robinson

There are an estimated 250,000 Children Soldiers.

Beah remembered his father's words to keep pushing forward, even though he is lost in the forest. He is able to hold onto life, even as he fights depression because he doesn't know were his family and friends are. Beah keeps moving onward even when horrible things happen to him because he believes that soul still has good in it, so long as he is alive. He knows that his life will end when he has run out of good fortune and has no fear of pushing forward toward whatever life has in store for him.

Theme 1 - Finding Himself

"These days I live in three worlds: my dreams, and the experiences of my new life, which trigger memories from the past" (Beah 20).

Theme 3 - Reality vs Fantasy

Analysis

"Sometimes we were asked to leave for war in the middle of a movie. We would come back hours later after killing many people and continue the movie as if we had just returned from intermission. we were always either at the front lines, watching a war movie, or doing drugs. There was no time to be alone or to think." (Beah 124).

In the violent times of the Sierra Leone civil war, Beah learns to focus on security and strength in his G3 rifle, war movies, and drugs for the two years of his military career. When his weapon is taken from him, he panics and feels at a loss without the tool of violence. This showed the soldiers' ability to cope with the chaos of the civil war. In a world where people may be killed at random, and death could come from any direction. Like other soldiers, Beah must accept this reality in order to survive and remain in control of the violent landscape of constant ambushes, raids, and sudden deaths.

Conclusion

I thought the book was very good and I enjoyed it. If you like books about war and the struggle to survive you will enjoy this book. You can relate this book to your live in some instances. I relate to this book where sometimes I'm lost and don't know what to do in a situation, and need help. For Ishmael he didn't have that help and was confused on what to do.