Ishmael Beah
Ishmael Beah
Ishmael Beahis a Sierra Leonean author and human rights activist who rose to fame with his acclaimed memoir, A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier. His most recent novel, Radiance of Tomorrow, was published in January 2014...
NationalitySierra Leonean
ProfessionAutobiographer
Date of Birth23 November 1980
CityMattru Jong, Sierra Leone
children war views
For many observers, a child who has known nothing but war, a child for whom the Kalashnikov is the only way to make a living and for whom the bush is the most welcoming community, is a child lost forever for peace and development. I contest this view. For the sake of these children, it is essential to prove that another life is possible.
war night thinking
I lay in my bed night after night staring at the ceiling and thinking, Why have I survived the war? Why was I the last person in my immediate family to be alive? I didn’t know.
heart knowing childhood
My childhood had gone by without my knowing, and it seemed as if my heart had frozen.
moon please-me childhood
I get a chance to observe the moon now, I still see those same images I saw when I was six, and it pleases me to know that that part of my childhood is still embedded in me.
pain awakening be-careful
This days one must be careful to avoid awakening the pain of another.
quiet speak knows
I am always quiet so that I know what to say when I must speak.
school kids thinking
I guess what I'd like to say is that people in Sierra Leone are human beings, just like Americans. They want to send their kids to school; they want to live in peace; they want to have their basic rights of life just like everyone else. I think we all owe an obligation to support people who want to do that.
war years two
In early 1993, when I was 12, I was separated from my family as the Sierra Leone civil war, which began two years earlier, came into my life.
boys imagination age
I grew up in Sierra Leone, in a small village where as a boy my imagination was sparked by the oral tradition of storytelling. At a very young age I learned the importance of telling stories - I saw that stories are the most potent way of seeing anything we encounter in our lives, and how we can deal with living.
soccer morning school
I had a very simple, unremarkable and happy life. And I grew up in a very small town. And so my life was made up of, you know, in the morning going to the river to fetch water - no tap water, and no electricity - and, you know, bathing in the river, and then going to school, and playing soccer afterwards.
children resilience suffering
...children have the resilience to outlive their sufferings, if given a chance.
father moving journey
When I was young, my father used to say, ‘If you are alive, there is hope for a better day and something good to happen. If there is nothing good left in the destiny of a person, he or she will die.’ I thought about these words during my journey, and they kept me moving even when I didn’t know where I was going. Those words became the vehicle that drove my spirit forward and made it stay alive.
letting-go fragility stills
I was still hesitant to let myself let go, because I still believed in the fragility of happiness.
journey ends my-journey
ONE OF THE UNSETTLING THINGS about my journey, mentally, physically, and emotionally, was that I wasn’t sure when or where it was going to end.