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A Long Way Gone By Ishmael Beah

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In 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. Beah is the head of the Ishmael Beah Foundation, this …show more content…

This memoir was written to anyone who can truly handle sadness, misery, and people who wanted to be educated about other cultures. Also, the purpose of this memoir was to educate people about the troubled childhood and teen years that he went through, but also to educate people on how war and great tragedy really affects children as well. Before reading this book, I had never heard or seen anything about the war in Sierra Leone and I think that was one of the biggest motivators for Ishmael Beah because he realized that not very many people knew there was a war and he wanted to inform more people about what really went on. Ishmael uses a lot of persuasive techniques like kairos, ethos, logos, and pathos to be able to educate people on …show more content…

This creates a sense of credibility to persuade the audience through his early life experiences. Ethos is used a lot throughout the book because this is his life experiences and his early childhood. Ishmael Beah uses the word, “I,”a lot throughout the book since all of this is coming from him and not anyone else. Right off the bat we can see, “The only wars I knew were of those that I had read about in books or seen in movies such as Rambo: First Blood, and the one in neighboring Liberia that I had heard on the BBC news,” (Beah 1). Since this book is written from a first person perspective it really helps out ethos because all of this information is coming straight from the source. There is not a more credible source to listen to on this because no one else has experienced exactly what Ishmael has experienced in his own

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The impact of war can have very harmful effects on people, especially children. In “A Long Way Gone” by Ishmael Beah, he explains the war of Sierra Leone from his point of view. The tragedy of losing his family, becoming a boy soldier, and the effects of war is said throughout the book, making it an interesting story to read. But, while Ishmael explains what he went through, it is hidden that other people were affected by the actions he took. Although Ishmael did play a victimizer, he was also a victim at the same time.

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564 Words | 3 Pages

A 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.

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800 Words | 4 Pages

Within Ishmael Beah’s book A Long Way Gone we see the sierra leone civil war take over and consume a young boy’s life. During Ishmael’s life his settings change rapidly because of the war, this causes him to change with his surroundings. Throughout the book the 3 reoccurring themes has to be family, death and food.

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1585 Words | 7 Pages

When he was twelve, Beah was separated from his family when the rebels attacked his village. Beah’s journey to escape the rebel forces led him through areas where he witnessed the horrors of war and it led him to war as a child soldier. Life as a child soldier left a deep impact on Ishmael Beah. Although, he recovered physically and mentally as children often do, Beah’s writing shows his difficulty in expressing his emotions.

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895 Words | 4 Pages

A Long Way Gone is an interesting, self-oriented book on the Sierra Leone Civil War because of the author’s intentions and credibility in writing, biases, and the lessons it taught. Ishmael Beah has made strong points in A Long Way Gone about his contentions of writing. Ishmael Beah wrote this memoir to inform people about the terrors of war and how the world knew little about the war while the innocent civilians suffered great

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887 Words | 4 Pages

In A Long Way gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier, Ishmael Beah explains his life and how he became a child soldier during Sierra Leone's civil war. During recounting his experiences, Beah uses literary devices which include metaphors, similes, personification, and symbolism to communicate his experiences. Before the war, Ishmael Beah was just a boy who enjoyed listening to rap music cassettes with his friends and preparing for the talent show. Ishmael Beah finally narrates the book when he is an adult, he tells us how carrying the tapes throughout the war changed his life. In his memoir, he used many associations with cassette tapes as a motif to show his psychological degradation and rehabilitation throughout his time in the civil war and return

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635 Words | 3 Pages

In the novel, “A Long Way Gone,” Ishmael Beah suffers from PTSD due to the exposure to war at such a young age and the rehabilitation process. Ishmael was exposed to guns, drugs and other types of violent acts due to the war at the age of 12. As time went by, Ishmael lost his family and slowly his friends too. Ishmael was traumatized from all the violence he experienced due to the war approaching his village. He had been forced by the Sierra Leone Armed Forces to serve as a child soldier during a civil war and “It was not easy being a soldier, but we just had to do it.

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1187 Words | 5 Pages

Whenever I speak at the United Nations, UNICEF, or elsewhere to raise awareness of the continual and rampant recruitment of children in wars around the world, I come to realize that I still do not fully understand how I could possibly have survived the civil war in my country, Sierra Leone. I need to put in a quote. The book A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier is an extremely powerful memoir written by Ishmael Beah. It tells the true story of his own experiences as a child soldier during the huge civil war in Sierra Leone. It is seen as a heartbreaking but still eye-opening account of the true horrors of war and the true resilience of the human spirit.

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Carson Edwards English I Ms. Thaden 10 February 2023 Family Provides Strength Twelve-year-old soldiers, blinded by cocaine, violence, and war, can only find strength through the love of family. Ishmael Beah, in his book, A Long Way Gone, is struggling through the war but keeps going toward the ultimate goal of seeing his family again, proving how the unfailing love of family will give one the strength to persevere through the hardest times. This book shows the instinctual longing for the family during times of need. Beah remembers a quote from his father during the beginning half of his war journey.

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Innocence Lost: Exploring the Lasting Physical and Psychological Impact on Child Soldiers “The war had given us new eyes to see the world, but they were eyes that would always haunt us”(Beah, 2008). Ishmael Beah’s book, A Long Way Gone, is a memoir of a boy soldier who talks about his first-hand experiences as a child soldier during the civil war in Sierra Leone. The book is a narrative that guides readers through the life of Ishmael Beah, from Beah’s childhood in a small village to the recruitment into government army and involvement in the war. Beah vividly describes the nightmares, flashbacks, and emotional stress he experiences even after being rescued and rehabilitated. Through Ishmael Beah’s story, Beah gives insight into the psychological

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498 Words | 2 Pages

ECR: A Long Way Gone In “A Long Way Gone”, Ishmael Beah's journey as a child soldier in Sierra Leone highlights the resilience required to survive in the face of traumatic events. Ishmael Beah's resilience in the face of trauma and adversity shows the importance of hope and determination in overcoming life's challenges. After a devastating attack in his village, Ishmael escapes and struggles for independence. "I ran for my life, my heart pounding, my mind racing.

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1110 Words | 5 Pages

Not experiencing war is a luxury many people unfortunately do not get; however, Ishmael Beah, the author of A Long Way Gone, lives and survives the war, though not without heartache. With war there is always fear, death, and hell. Ishmael Beah proves war is hell through the killing of civilians, the distrust, and the after effects of the war. Ishmael proves war is hell through the killing of civilians. Many innocent bystanders of the war are forced out of their homes, made to run for their lives.

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691 Words | 3 Pages

Ishmael is continuing to teach about the Sierra Leone civil war and how it can severely negatively impact children and communities. This story is a good reminder of why we should protect the youth, and shows the importance of mental

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498 Words | 2 Pages

The way Beah explained what happened to him, he did it in a sad way. My response to the writer is that I feel sorry for him. I cannot relate to him in any way since I have never been exposed to war and even been a soldier fighting in it. He was strong through the hardest part of his life; the actual war itself, rehabilitation, and ultimately escaping Freetown, Sierra Leone to eventually fly over to New York and start a new life. Ishmael Beah’s memoir, A Long Way Gone, replays a part of Beah’s life that will always be very vivid to him.

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946 Words | 4 Pages

People should read it because not only is it informative but relatable in some aspects. The theme of family and love universal, anyone can relate to it. Everybody has somebody that they continue to fight for, someone who is their everything and they’ll do anything for because that’s how much they love them. Ishmael’s story explores that, how his family kept him going. His story also informs those who are less knowledgeable in the history of Sierra Leone.

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