In the memoir A Long Way Gone, the author, Ishmael Beah, relates his story to the title. On page 65, the author says: “We were a long way from Mattru Jong. A long way gone.” The title, A Long Way Gone, gives the reader a glimpse of how far Ishmael is away from Mattru Jong, his life before being a soldier, and how distant he is with himself.…
In the novel A Long Way Gone Ishmael Beah describes to us what it was like to live in the terrifying times in Sierra Leone, South Africa. A civil war started from the want of mass diamond production, Streets were filled with chaos. Children traveling the streets from town to town were exposed to traumatizing and life changing events. In Beah's novel the traumatic effects of war, drug addiction, and mass murder all lead to the experience of PTSD. A post traumatic stress disorder that not only affects themselves but family members and friends also.…
To begin with, Beah lost many parts of his life. In the book, he says, "The war that forces us to run away from our homes, lose our families, and aimlessly roam the forests" (Beah, 199). When the war reached his home village, his life dramatically shifted. This shift forced Beah to find a new way to survive. When the author hid alone in a forest, he said "I didn't know what to do with my life, I felt that I was starting over and over…
The tone of the story is very wistful. The readers get a wistful sense, especially at the end of the short story. At the end all the characters have been able to push past their loses and find joy in the things that stopped them from wallowing in sadness. Throughout the story, sadness, wistfulness, anger and happiness pervade. The author uses diction, “Yallah!”…
Guns are a controversial thing in today’s society. Whether you are for or against them provoke fear in other’s unarmed. Guns are a way that enables anyone to gain power. In A Long Way Gone a memoir by Ishmael Beah he talks about how his early life was in Sierra Leone, where a war was going on during the time. Beah affected by the war, discussing how he felt and still feels today, “That person pointed the gun at the place where I had been shot and pulled the trigger. I woke up and hesitantly touched my side. I became afraid, since I could no longer tell the difference between dream and reality” (15). Beah tells the reader how his mental health has declined as distinguishing the difference from reality and his dreams are not present. This inability…
Throughout history wars have been fought mercilessly and without remorse especially in guerilla warfare. In A Long Way Gone, author Ishmael beah, explains in vivid detail his experience during the war and the horrors it came with. Throughout his journey he tends to see the environment around him fall apart. While it may seem hellish and unforgiving nature itself tries to run from the war. Nature itself does not consider war to be natural since it is driven by murder rather than…
I feel that guns give people power through fear, I don’t strongly agree with this statement because if all of the opposing sides had guns then the power is eliminated.…
It is important that the student has no one he considers an appropriate teacher because he needs to have an open mind. His teacher is a gorilla after all, and if the student had a predisposition towards a human teacher, then he probably would not embrace the teachings of Ishmael.…
In the book Long Way Gone Ishmael Beah struggles between trust and survival in the midst of a gruesome war. He laments how, “the war had destroyed the enjoyment of the very experience of meeting people” throughout the book there are many examples of this upsetting truth. The consequences of this mistrust in people are clear as he travels through Sierra Leon while being incessantly threatened and assumed a member of the RUF. Most of this book is about the ongoing struggle within Ishmael between trying to stay alive and deciding who to trust. The phenomena of war and trust can coexist only if you have an ability to differentiate your friends from enemies. Ishmael struggles throughout the book to stay alive, and thus decides to trust no one, but this could be detrimental to his survival.…
All in all, students will receive many different messages from Ishmael Beah’s memoir, A Long Way Gone but the curriculum has vivid imagery to get the point across to readers. Undoubtedly, English IV department should keep on teaching students the meaning beyond of Beah’s touching…
In A Long Way Gone, weapons, Shakespeare monologues and rap music are significant symbols used throughout the novel. Comparatively, in The Bite of the Mango the mango and her passion for acting are main symbols used throughout the book. Both the mango in The Bite of the Mango and weapons in A Long Way Gone represent a loss of innocence for both characters. Ishmael killed a human being with an AK-47, which marked the transition from childhood to a manhood. “The idea of death at all and killing had become as easy as drinking water” (Beah 122). At first, Ishmael feared the idea of becoming a soldier, but as time progressed the army had brainwashed him into believing killing was a daily living activity. In contrast, the loss of innocence in The Bite of the Mango occured when picked up and ate the mango without using her hands. This event reassured Mariatu that she would still able to live with no hands; it would simply be more difficult. In both books, coping mechanisms are coupled with symbols. Ishmael and Mariatu both use theater performances to help cope with the struggles of the war. In particular, when Ishmael recites Shakespeare monologues and raps lyrics, it reminds him the simplicity of life before the war. Ishmael used to rap with his friends and recite Shakespeare s to residents of his village before the war; therefore, performing and taking part in activities temporarily solved Ishmael’s struggles and distracted him…
The book A Long Way Gone is a memoir about a boy soldier named Ishmael Beah, that lived in Sierra Leone, Africa. He lived a normal life going to school and playing soccer with his friends. In his village there was an attack from the Rebels which ended up having him and his family get split up during the attack. He then runs off into the forest and finds some kids that went to his school and they stick together to be a group. They travel for many days to only be captured by nearby Rebels that then take them in as prisoners to their camp.…
A topic that is shown throughout A Long Way Gone is the desire to escape the war. Ishmael Beah had the want, the need, and the desire to escape the war that was happening in Sierra Leone. He had to escape those who turned on the country and became rebels. Running away became part of his life for many years until he join the soldiers. There he would fight for his country to escape from the cruelty the rebels were bringing to Sierra Leone. Ishmael was a very brave child to be constantly escaping and running away from guys who were setting villages on fire and carried AK47s and G3s with them. After being put into a rehabilitation center he had to escape those fears and awful thought from the war. He needed to make those thoughts go…
Author of A Long Way Gone, Ishmael Beah, lived in a county that was collapsing at the seams that caused great tragedies and bloodshed. It was in this time that he was forced into a survival situation. “I passed through…
“Among the people of our culture, which want to destroy the world?” “Which want to destroy it? As far as I know, no one specifically wants to destroy the world.” “And yet you do destroy it, each of you. Each of you contribute daily to the destruction of the world.” (Quinn, pp. 25). Through the composition of Daniel Quinn, “Ishmael”, it is clearly illustrated that through the daily actions and practices of the humankind, humans are irresponsibly exploiting the supplies that mother nature had been providing. From his experience from being ambushed out of the jungle, kept in a zoo in 1930’s, bought and taken care of in a private home by Mr. Sokolow and being kept in a menagerie, the truth of man destroying the world was in depth revealed through…