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Book Report On A Long Way Gone By Ishmael Beah

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Kali Griffin Ms D’Ambrosia English 9H II 15 March 2024 Ishmael’s Recovery Hope is possible in any situation because hope is not a fact, rather it is a positive outlook to encourage you to keep moving forward. A Long Way Gone by Ishmael Beah is an inspiring yet eye-opening memoir about Ishamael’s experience as a child refugee. Although Ishmael has been through things that no normal child has been through, there is still hope for him to live an ordinary, happy life. Despite the fact that war comes with horror and tragedy, with the right help, Ishmael can recover and move past it. After Ishmael gets settled in with his new family, he is offered to do a speech at an event about child refugees. Ishmael happily accepts this opportunity as he is excited to educate others about his personal experiences. He …show more content…

I am not a soldier anymore; I am a child. We are all brothers and sisters. What I have learned from my experiences is that revenge is not good” (Beah 199). This supports my claim because not only is Ishmael able to openly talk about his trauma from war, he is able to acknowledge how it has taught him many valuable lessons. Ishmael is very motivated to become happy and move on from his experiences at war and accepts rehabilitation with the help of Esther. Rather than being angry at the war and holding a grudge against soldiers, he knows they are people too and went through the same things he did. Ishmael will be able to recover some of his childhood innocence before the war, especially being with the other kids his age and having fun. Ishamel takes a trip to New York with his new friend, Madoka, for a conference. When they first get there, they are amazed by the city as they've never seen anything like it. The author shows how confused yet astonished he is by saying, “Mesmerized by the displays”. After we were able to tear our eyes away from them, we walked up and down Broadway for hours, staring at the store

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The book A Long Way Gone by Ishmael Beah is a memoir about himself involved in war as a child. War began happening in Ishmael’s hometown in Sierra Leone, which was Mogbwemo, so everyone broke apart and he lost his family, except for his brother. He had to start running away from the war to stay alive, so he went with some of his friends and his brother into different provinces of Sierra Leone. They went from village to village looking for food, shelter and safety. Ishmael was caught many times by the army and he thought he was stuck with them forever, but he escaped many different ways.

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BOOK REPORT A Long Way Gone Part I: Summary A Long Way Gone is a memoir by Ishmael Beah about his experiences as a child soldier during the Sierra Leone Civil War. The book begins with Beah's childhood in Sierra Leone, where he has a relatively peaceful life with his family until the war reaches his village.

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Unfortunately, because of the torment the rebels have caused among people, Ishmael was traumatized. He thought to himself that he will never be safe

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A Long Way Gone is memoir that was written by a young soldier by the name of Ishmael Beah who was forced into the war raging army for the sake of his protection and survival. Ishmael’s story is full of traumatizing experiences and the violent conflicts that occur in being a child solider. His home village, Sierra Leone, was attached by a rampant group of rebels who were devoted in destroying and killing everything and everyone one in its path. During the time of the attack, Ishmael, his brother, and friends began to wonder off to different villages as a way to escape the rebel’s wrath. Maneuvering from village to village required the group of boys to endure the struggles of finding food, shelter, and safety.

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Ishmael became a victim of the war the moment he became a boy soldier. He was only a young teen at the time, where substances took over his life, as he states, “In the daytime, instead of playing soccer in the village square,

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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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When the war had just begun, Ishmael was driven to continue by his biological family, “I wanted to see my family, even if it meant dying for them” (Beah 96). As the war continues his biological family drives him in a different way, “I got angrier, because they looked

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1294 Words | 6 Pages

6 PG. 37) Also another main focus could be, just because something you been through was bad, doesn’t mean that effect would be negative. Meaning, Ishmael didn’t know what to expect once becoming a boy soldier. However he was given drugs at a young age, to let nothing bother him and stopping him from doing his duties.

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As a young child, Ishmael “had no trust or any kind of normality”(2) in his life, Ishmael wanted to have a normal childhood; he wanted to have a place to call home and live with a family who was willing to take care of him, so ismael moved to new york while moving to new york ishmael met his new adoptive mother and now ishamel relizes he has to step into normality here in new york, what was not so normal for ishmael was that he never had a report card, and ishmael needed a report

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I was determined to make it to the end of the war alive" (p. 186). Ishmael’s determination to persist is driven by his fear of mortality. Despite the slim probability of survival, his fear of mortality compelled him to move forward. This forces him out of complacency and acceptance which drives him toward safety. This motivation ultimately enabled him to endure the hazardous conflicts he encounters throughout the story.

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"We were all scared, but there was nothing we could do. We had to walk forward, we had to fight, we had to survive” (Beah Pg 42). This illustrates the tenacity Ishmael had to show to endure as a young soldier in Sierra Leone. Despite his fear and uncertainty, Ishmael knows he must move forward and fight for his life. Ishmael is a prime example of the resilience that can be enforced in the face of even the most traumatic situations, due to his ability to adapt and his dedication to surviving.

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This transformation from a playful child mind to savagery showcases humanity being detrimental to child soldiers. Lastly, Ishmael Beah’s post-war struggles of reintegrating into society showcase the permanent effects of the traumatic experiences he encountered, and that his innocence has vanished for good. During the last part of his memoir, Beah discusses the border, “I avoided eye contact, afraid that they might see in my eyes that I had once been a soldier in the war that I was now leaving behind” (Beah 219). This encapsulates the emotional turmoil that Ishamael must now go through as a result of his harsh experiences as a child soldier. Despite his newfound freedom, he still finds it difficult to grapple with the recent feelings of displacement in society, knowing that deep down he is a massively different person than he was prior.

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1110 Words | 5 Pages

Ishmael says, “I wasn’t sure whether he was unconscious or dead. I didn’t care” (Beah 135). Ishmael is no longer in the war, yet the violence and numbness to it continues. The hell from war made its way into a normal life for Ishmael. He will never be the same Ishmael from before the war.

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600 Words | 3 Pages

It explains why this quote represents a sudden end to adolescence, opposite to the peaceful past where he comes from; the contrast between peace and mayhem within his personality is very evident. The serene reminiscences of his clan make him feel closer to their nostalgia and sorrow after losing everything they loved so much. Ishmael undergoes a radical transformation from a young, innocent boy to a hard-working and experienced soldier in war. His humanity is removed when he witnesses and participates in acts of violence, whereby he becomes numb and detached. “We went to work, killing everyone in sight.

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1035 Words | 5 Pages

Later, 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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