Theme Of Unbroken By Laura Hillenbrand

Unbroken is a true story told by Laura Hillenbrand from the words and memories of Louis Zamperini. The main themes, survival, resilience and redemption, are illustrated throughout the story. Louie Zamperini becomes an Olympic athlete by his determination and influence of his older brother Pete. However, once World War II starts, Louie starts a new chapter of his life by becoming an expert of the Norton Bomb Sight on one of the many notorious B-24s. After many outrageous missions on the unreliable equipment, Louie and his squadron are forced to crash into the ocean. Louie and two of the other men that survived the crash had a journey ahead of them that would shape their lives forever. The men floated on the open sea for 47 days

While on the raft, Louie held himself together trying to calm the men, “Louie reassured [Mac] that the squadron would come for them, that they were likely to be found that night…” (Hillenbrand, 2010, P. 128). Also, Hillenbrand purposefully paces the reading slowly while he is on the raft to give the reader a small glimpse of the effort that it took for him to keep sane. “The coolness of the ocean beckoned and couldn’t be answered, for the sharks circled. One shark, six or eight feet long, stalked the rafts without rest, day and night. The men became especially weary of him, and when he ventured too close, one of them would jab him with an oar” (Hillenbrand, 2010, P. 141). Although most of the time on the raft was spent dreaming of land, Louie knew that in order for them to stay sane they needed to talk to each other. "…Louie turned the raft into a nonstop quiz show” (Hillenbrand, 2010, P. 145). Louie was the main reason that he and his other survivor made it to land sane as could be

Without the redemption in Louie’s life, he would not have been able to call his life unbroken. One day after hearing a passing by pastor preach he felt convicted deeply. So, “That morning, he believed, he was a new creation” (Hillenbrand, 2012, P. 376). Like Louie, many other post POWs have had incredible stories, yet when the war was over, they fell into becoming a victim to the bottle. However, after many hard months, Louie was no longer drowning in his bitterness and grief. He knew what God had done for him, and forgiveness replaced his bitterness. “In bewilderment, the men who had abused him watched him come to them, his hands extended, a radiant smile on his face” (Hillenbrand, 2010, P.380). If Hillenbrand would have left this part out of the book and ended Louie’s journey when the war was over, Unbroken would be much less impactful and the point of Louis Zamperini’s life would have been missed. I only wish this portion of the book was put more emphasis