Memoirs of a Boy Soldier - Book Report/Review Example

A Long Way Gone by Ishmael Beah Outline I. Introduction: Who Beah is and background information II. The beginnings, a call to adventure III. Rebels: liberators or villains? IV. Beah’s mentors and their influence on him V. Beah’s mind struggles VI. The realization VII. New beginnings for a child soldier VIII. Change comes eventually IX. Beah’s lesson: a new advocate is born A Long Way Gone by Ishmael Beah A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier is a book written by Ishmael Beah and was published in 2007. It is a first-hand account of the long civil war in Sierra Leone and an example of the plight of child soldiers worldwide in war-torn countries. Beah was born in November 23rd 1980 in Mattru Jong, Bonthe district, Sierra Leone (Iweala n.pag) . Facing attacks from rebels in Sierra Leone at the age of 12, Beah had no choice but to run for his life. As a result, he was separated from his immediate family. He wandered through the war-torn country and was then forced to join the army where he was brainwashed into believing in the power of arms and bloodshed alone. At the tender age of 13, the young boy had experienced what many only have the chance to dream about or just imagine in their entire lives. At 16 however, he war rescued by UNICEF and removed from the unit, being given another chance to live a normal life, to heal the wounds of war, to forgive and be forgiven and to love and be loved again. He was given an opportunity to use his experience to show others and teach them about the atrocities of war, and became an ambassador of the child soldiers worldwide. As a boy, Ishmael and his family are less connected to the war in the country until they begin to see refugees passing. These families have walked long distances, fleeing from the adversities and atrocities of the war in the land. The children would not even look at them and would jump at the slightest sound. Ishmael and his friends cannot fathom what these people have gone through. At this time, he is only 10 years old. The first time that Ishmael is involved with the affairs of the war is when he is 12. It is in January 1993 when Ishmael, his brother Junior and their friend Talloi decide to travel to the town called Mattru Jong to take part in a talent show. The boys had formed a rap group when Ishmael was only eight and had rapped together ever since. They had discovered this kind of music while watching television and had met on every weekend to study it. They didn’t even know what it was called for a long time but had been excited by the fact that black folks knew how to speak English very fast and to the beat. This was the hero’s call to adventure. This story points out the transition of an innocent boy who is industrious and talented into a drug-addicted killing machine who later finds his way back into a civilized society, thanks to the humanitarian efforts of the UNICEF. This is well stated by Jones, ‘The Hero’s Journey is always about a transition” (Jones 13). Jones states in his presentation that “The Dark Side’ represents inhumanity: treating people or the earth like machines or as disposable items.” Those who follow the ‘dark side’ are called villains. In this story, the villains are the rebels on the Revolutionary United Front (RUF). The rebels claim that they want to liberate the people from a bad government but are their actions really those of liberation? This is not the case as seen by what they do. They kill innocent people including children who have no part in the governance of the country. When Ishmael, Junior and his friend come to Kabati village, they sit on the verandah contemplating whether they should go on to their home when suddenly a Volkswagen van roars into their grandmother’s homestead. On emerging from the van, they see the driver bleeding from the arm and vomiting blood. When then other door opens, a woman’s body falls to the ground and inside the vehicle are three dead children, all this is done by the hand of the rebels who claim to be doing their people a favor by fighting the government troops but in the real sense are the villains slaughtering their own people. The van is followed by a crowd of people who are wounded, one particular woman with a dead baby on her back whose body is full of holes made by bullets. The rebels send a messenger, a young boy who has all but his thumbs amputated in the “thumbs up” style to inform the people that they need to be welcomed into the villages because they are fighting for the people’s cause. When the rebels enter the village, they come shooting into the air. They block the out of town route, forcing the people towards the river. They try to capture the people, especially women and children, to use them as a shield against the government troops and whoever tries to escape is shot and killed. These are acts of villains. According to Jones, mentors are those people who “give heroes tools or ideas that help them to discern, or, sort out reality,” (16). In this story, Ishmael has several people who contribute to his beliefs and way of life. One of these people is his grandmother Mamie Kpana who taught him the meaning of an adage that people ought to strive to be like the moon. People grumble when there is too much sun and also when it is too cold but when the moon shines, no one complains. She thus taught him that people need to be in the best of their behavior and to be good to others. His grandmother had once narrated a story about a hunter who after eating a certain plant could change into a wild boar and would lure real pigs and later change into a human and eat them. Once the pigs discovered the plant that gave this hunter this power, they destroyed the plant and later tore him to pieces. This was a good lesson to Ishmael in relation to his own countrymen who had turned against the innocent and were devouring them. She had also taught him that in the sky, there are always answers and explanations to everything; this includes every suffering, pain, confusion and joy. Another mentor to Ishmael is his grandfather Kamor (teacher), a well known Arabic scholar who used to prepare for him medicine, one which was meant to help him remember all his life’s lessons, and true to this day, Ishmael has photographic memory. His father’s words also have a profound influence on him and as he walks in the deep forest and is afraid of the snakes and runs in fear, what keeps him going are his father’s words that as long as one is alive, there is hope for a better day and for good things to happen. One other person who helps Ishmael in his journey of self-realization is Esther, a nurse who becomes friendly to him, encourages him by telling him that all that happened was not his fault. Esther treats Ishmael as a brother, she does not judge him and neither does she blame him for his behavior. Jones gives us great insight to the fact that “heroes always get wounded” (15). Their injury can be physical or psychological and for Ishmael, his was deep psychological torture. He is a boy who is not accustomed to violence but by the pain that he goes through after losing his family and seeing all the gruesome scenes of violence, his heart changes. He develops a hatred for the rebels after being told severally that these are the same people who killed his family. From this moment, he becomes fearless and a certain rage possesses him to the extent that he kills without mercy. He becomes a totally different person, no longer with boyhood affections but with evil that continuously becomes seasoned like that of a grown man. One night Ishmael has a dream that they are swimming in a river at Mattru Jong together with Junior, diving for oysters. When they return home, no one is there and as he turns to ask Junior what the matter is, he is also nowhere to be found. Instead, he is surrounded by many faceless people who begin shooting and slicing each other’s throats and the result is a bath of blood. He goes outside and finds his family present but they don’t seem to notice that he is covered with blood. The rain begins to fall and he remains outside washing off the blood as the family enters the house but when he turns to enter the house, he realizes that the house and his family have disappeared. As he dreams, he falls off the bed then wakes up and at this moment, he does not know if he is dreaming or it is really happening. He remains terrified after this dream. The next day he visits Esther and she notices that something is wrong. She asks him to narrate the dream and when he finishes, she tells him that it is not his fault. Though he has heard this phrase very many times and had grown to dislike it, this day he thinks about it deeply and begins to believe it. He remembers all that he has gone through and done and understands that it is not his fault that it happened, neither is it his fault that he has become what he is. This is the beginning of self-realization and as Jones puts it, the wounds “build character; making heroes human, adult, and, if they’re lucky, wise” (15). Though Ishmael begins to feel this way, it does not remove the guilt that has welled up in him regarding the atrocities he has done, but it lightens the burdens of his memories and gives him strength to bring to memory and contemplate on the things that have happened. One day Esther invites Ishmael for dinner at her house and after they have eaten, they go outside to watch the moon. He tells her of how he used to watch the moon as a small boy, looking for shapes in it. He feels that the moon is following him and remembers how his grandmother told him that in the sky there are answers and explanations to everything that happens in life. This is a good sign that shows that Ishmael is healing steadily though slowly. A new beginning emerges in Ishmael’s life and he decides to nurture his talents. He spends time listening to reggae music and writing down lyrics and also is deeply engrossed in reading, especially Shakespeare who has a profound influence on him. Esther gives him a walkman and cassettes and so he visits the clinic regularly to listen to the cassettes using the walkman. He also engages in conversations with Esther through which he expresses himself and begins to open up to her, revealing his greatest fears and his worst memories to her. They become very good friends and she accepts him as a younger brother. As Jones puts it, we see a hero “coming to accept him- or herself for who they really are, accepting others for who they really are, and accepting the universe for what it really is” (22). One day, Esther tells Ishmael about visitors who are coming to the center and that they want the boys to hold a talent show. Esther asks Ishmael to sing his reggae music but Ishmael wants to perform a Shakespearean monologue. She agrees to this but still she would like him to perform his reggae songs. At this point, they reach an agreement that he would do both. The visitors are from the UN, UNICEF and other nongovernmental organizations and when they arrive, they mingle with the crowd to interact with the boys as they highly anticipate the performance at the show. Stories like the Bra Spider, Ishmael’s monologue and a hip-hop play that he had written about the redemption of a child soldier are presented. After the performance, Mr. Kamara, the director of the center is very impressed and requests Ishmael to become the spokesman of the center by giving speeches about how it is possible to salvage the life of a child soldier like he had been. Ishmael agrees to this proposal and soon finds himself frequently speaking in Freetown. This is a great step in Ishmael’s life as a result of a change of mind. Seven months since his arrival at the center, Leslie informs Ishmael that since he had no living family, when his duration of stay at the center elapses, he would be placed under the care of a foster family. Ishmael tells him that his father had once mentioned his uncle who lived in Freetown and was a carpenter. Leslie replies that finding him may not be possible, but nevertheless he would give it a try. One Sunday in the afternoon Leslie arrives with Ishmael’s uncle who is overjoyed to see him. Ishmael is not sure that this is the man his father had talked about but when he sees the man shedding tears of joy, he is convinced that this is truly his uncle and finally Ishmael could smile. His uncle offers to give him a home after his stay at the center but Ishmael says that he hardly knows him. His uncle then tells him that though they cannot go back, they would begin from there and he promises to be visiting Ishmael every weekend. He comments that the boy looks like his father but hoped that he did not possess his father’s stubbornness. After his uncle leaves, Ishmael is so overjoyed that he does not know what to do and so he goes on to listen to music. By the change of his mind and actions, we see that Ishmael becomes passionate again, he learns to be accepted by others and this helps him to find a family that he had lost. He also makes friends and learns to enjoy the company of others. It can be seen that Ishmael is welcomed by his uncle’s family when he takes him home and his uncle’s wife embraces him and calls him her son. Ishmael’s cousins also are overjoyed to meet him and Allie, the oldest boy is happy to have another boy in the family. Ishmael’s actions and decisions also make him to be nominated for a position in a conference on children at war to be held at the UN in New York. This news is brought to him by Leslie. Ishmael is dumbfounded as he does not believe that he will be chosen but nevertheless he dresses up and goes to the address given to him by Leslie for an interview. Later on, Mr. Kamara visits Ishmael to inform him that he has been chosen for the conference. Ishmael does not tell many people this good news but finally when the time comes, he informs his uncle and a few friends, though his uncle does not believe him. Ishmael is given this opportunity because of his past experiences and what he has learnt from them. He has finally come to terms with his being and is able to teach others how to become victorious in this form of suffering just as he overcame. Jones asks, “Will the hero become or remain a part of a state or corporate machine?” (21).This is not the case with Ishmael. He has decided to forge forward to champion for the cause of other children enslaved by the war. It is in New York that he meets Laura Simms the storyteller during the conference. She is a friendly woman who brings the boys winter outfit while they are freezing due to the cold weather. Ishmael’s visit in New York is emotional and full of wonderful experience. Though it cannot erase the horror he experienced, he comes to understand that there is a world where he can be free and safe with people who will remember him. Ishmael and Mohamed begin school at St. Edward and the boys are excited about the new life of learning, note taking, making friends and playing with others. Unfortunately, there are other students who would not go near him, neither will they relate to him because he was a child soldier. However, Ishmael’s strength and resolution to be a normal person guides him into holding his peace and smiling because nothing could happen that was worse than what he had seen and been before. Not long after Ishmael is in school, a coup is held by the Sebels, a joint force of the soldiers and the rebels who decided to oust the civilian elected president. He hears Johnny Paul Koroma announcing over the radio that he is the new president of Sierra Leone. War erupts again and gunshots can be heard all over the land. People are being killed and everyone has to run for his life. Ishmael and his friend go out in search for food and are captured but luckily they escape and hide in a gutter. People are so fearful but Ishmael does not fear because he has seen this scene before. Instead, he is angry at their tormentors. The difference is that, this time, he does not decide to fight the war again but instead, he seeks for a way to escape the horrors of the war. He tries to get in touch with Laura Simms but all is in vain. His uncle dies of illness because he does not have proper medication since the doctors have gone into hiding. It seems that he is losing everyone that was close to him and meant so much in his life. This is in line with what Jones says about mentors that “Heroes always lose their mentors – who either leave or die” (17). Finally, Ishmael manages to communicate with Laura who tells him that he has a home with her. Ishmael then begins his journey that will lead him to Ney York again. What becomes of Ishmael is that he finally makes his way into New York after spending time at the Sierra Leonean embassy. He goes to school and after finishing the last two years of high school at the United Nations International School, goes to Oberlin College where he graduates in 2004 with a Bachelor of Arts degree and becomes actively involved with different groups that are involved with helping children involved and affected by war. He won the Oberlin’s Dainne Vruels Fiction Prize for his story “At Noon” (Novelguide n.pag). He has escaped the gruesome war in his country and finally finds peace for his soul. From this story we learn that war is a terrible evil to be avoided at all costs and that all people need to embrace peace and find peaceful solutions to all human problems. Beah is currently a member of the Human Rights Watch Children’s Rights Division Advisory Committee. In 2008, he co-founded the Network of Young People Affected by War (NYPAW) aimed at raising awareness of the plight of children in war zones, advocating ending hostilities and serving as role models for children that are struggling to recover from the effects of war (UNICEF). Works Cited “A Long Way Gone: Biography: Ishmael Beah.” Novelguide.com, Novelgide.com. Jones, “Story Telling for Social Impact.” (2012). PPT presentation. UNICEF People, “Ishmael Beah: Advocate for Children Affected by War”( 2012). Iweala, Uzodinma. “Slaughter of Innocence”. The Guardian, 26th May (2007). Read More