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Escape From Camp 14 By Blaine Harden

2150 Words9 Pages

Shin Dong-hyuk lived in a North Korean camp for most of his life. As of right now, there are about 150,000 to 200,000 people imprisoned in these camps. In the biography Escape from Camp 14 by Blaine Harden, Shin Dong-hyuk is the only known prisoner in North Korea's camps to have escaped. Shin was born in Camp 14 and grew up without any knowledge of the outside world. Many things happened to him, he witnessed a fellow student beaten to death; he was badly burned over hot coals; had a finger chopped off; was lice-ridden, cold, and nearly always hungry. Shin miraculously did make it out, and now he lives a free life in California. In the biography Escape from Camp 14 by Blaine Harden, the author’s use of imagery and descriptive diction show the …show more content…

There is the understanding that reading it, the reader can see the whole picture instead of just what Shin experiences. Because Shin doesn’t know what the outside world is really like, and has not lived outside the camp, he can only understand certain aspects of what’s good and not ok in the camp. The fact Shin now understands that being in this camp is not good, and he knows he needs to escape, that’s great. He finally got the whole picture and stopped seeing what was in front of him. With the help from Park's stories of the food outside and life beyond the camp Shin knows he and Park need to get out. This is a quintessential turning point for Shin because from birth he was trained to respect the guards and snitch when necessary, but now that he knows the camp is no good he has grown. He finally understood how the camp was not good. The author did this using the sense of descriptive diction very well. Without it there would be no evidence that Shin was a new man seeking …show more content…

Through these relationships, it is easy to see how they change Shin. The imagery and descriptive diction used play a huge role in the biography. It helps describe the relationships shin has and it moves the story along. If there wasn't any at all, the story more or less may be boring, or wouldn't bring justice to Shin's story. Shin is the only one as of right now to have escaped camp 14. Saying that means a lot, because of the extensive watch over the borders of the camp, it's nearly impossible to escape. Shin did it though, he made it out alive, and made it out of North Korea somehow getting to the U.S., and now lives a free life in

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