Analysis Of Mitch Albom's The Five People You Meet In Heaven

The book, The Five People You Meet in Heaven by Mitch Albom is a book full of reflection, life lessons, and experiences of the joys and sorrows that accompany life. The Five People You Meet in Heaven is about an old man named Eddie who meets his death after an accident at a theme park. On his path to heaven, Eddie meets five people from his life who he had an impact on, or who impacted him. These people teach Eddie important lessons before he is ready to move on. In the portion of the book about Eddie’s 2nd person, his captain, Eddie learns more about his life at war. The movie, The Five People You Meet in Heaven is very similar to the book at this part. In the section about war, in both the book and the movie, Eddie relives his experiences

Everyone knows that the battle of Midway and the battle of Stalingrad were turning points of World War II. Allies defeated Axis Power successfully is not enough to make them be the turning points. The more important reason is that Allies took more advantages to win the war – the view of who will won the war changed. Turning points also exist in everyone's life. They change people's attitude to live. In The Five People You Meet in Heaven written by Mitch Albom, there were many turning points in Eddie's life as well. Eddie's viewpoints of life changed by meeting Marguerite, injuring his leg in the war and saving the girl called Amy or Annie at Ruby Pier.

There are simple things in life that could mean something so important, yet our society doesn’t seem to notice it. Well, in this novel, it is the perfect example of that. Throughout the book, The Five You Meet In Heaven, an eye catching quote was stated. The author Mitch Albom mentions, “Nothing important. No bank statements. No insurance policies. Just a black bow tie, a Chinese restaurant menu, an old deck of cards, a letter with an army medal, and a faded Polaroid of a man by a birthday cake, surrounded by children.” Each of those items represent an important character in the novel. For some background knowledge, The Five People you Meet in Heaven is a novel written by Mitch Albom. The story is based upon the main character who is an old man named Eddie and has worked on the Ruby Pier all his life. His life comes to an end when he tries to save a little girl from a collapsed cart of a ride, but the cart lands on Eddie and kills him. Eddie then arrives in heaven and travels through five different environments to learn lessons from five different people. These five people were important in his life. Everything works out in the end and he is reunited with his one true love, Marguerite, at the pier with lovely children galloping all around. So from that quote and reading this inspiring novel, conclusions can be made of who represents each item. These objects symbolize important moments that have happened in Eddie’s life.

The author Mitch Albom incorporates sacrifice which is a big part of being a brothers keeper in The Five People you Meet in Heaven. Eddie was in war for a short period of time, during this time The Captain becomes his keeper because he shot himself in the leg to protect Eddie, as a captain he should have done this. He teaches him that grieving is the only way out of a tough situation, similar to the one he is in. Eddie does not recognize the reasoning behind why he did what he did. The Captain explains to Eddie, "Sacrifice, you made one. I made one. We all make them. But you are angry over yours. You kept thinking about what you lost… You didn’t get it. Sacrifice is a part of life." (Albom 93). By doing this it shows his bravery, loyalty and companionship towards Eddie. He shot Eddie in the leg so Eddie would not die in the burning tent. Even though he sacrificed his life for Eddies he was

Clearly Jackie Robinson displayed moral courage by fighting racism and playing Major League Baseball as the first african-american player to do so. Jackie had to constantly avoid resorting to violence; he had to take everyone’s abuse, and in order to achieve his overall goal. African-Americans would have joined Major League Baseball at some point in time, however Jackie pioneered the progression of this idea which allowed for African-Americans to join the League sooner than people initially

Turning against the world of drugs and violence, Eddie vows to take the straight and narrow path, even if it means struggling at temporary manual labor jobs. So when he takes a landscaping job for a white man across town thinking that god had finally heard him, the man's truck is stolen from the front of Eddie's apartment causing yet another problem to add on. He hid for hours and days drinking because he really liked his job with the white man and was afraid of what might happen to him. Although getting the truck stolen from him kinda seems like a big deal, it is not because that sort of thing happens daily in the streets of fresno that he lived by, it was almost like that was something normal to him. So when his aunt gets home she reminds him yet another time that his cousin died only this time a gun came with the tortillas she would try and persuade him with the avenge the death of her son.

In the year of 1919 January the 31st a man was born who would later change history in America. Using his athletic prowess in sports to challenge the societal norms and make way for other forward thinking people as himself. This man’s name was Jack Roosevelt Robinson born in Cairo, Georgia the youngest of five siblings. His parents came from humble backgrounds, Sharecroppers being the only black family on the block. Being raised by a single mother of five Jackie encountered a lot of prejudice which only made his family bond strengthen which he would need for what was to come later in his historic life.

Jackie Robinson was the first ever African American to ever play in Major League Baseball. This caused a major change in Major League Baseball history because he was the first one to play in a all white league. He had to deal with a lot of people being mean to him and trying to hurt him and also trying to get him to lash out at people so that he could get kicked out of the MLB. This theme can be seen in the work of Henry David Thoreau. An example of this theme can be seen in the movie 42. Walden by Henry David Thoreau, and 42 by Brian Helgeland show that hard work and dedication leads to success in life.This theme is supported by tone, self-reliance, and characters perseverance in both texts.

His second stop is where he meets his commanding officer of his world war II platoon. Eddie remembers being held captive along with his captain and four others. He also was the one responsible for coming up with a plan for them to escape. After they did that the captain told them to burn the place they were held captive but eddie ran back because he thought he saw a young girl, but a bullet was shot and hit him right in the knee. He learned the importance of sacrifice from the captain who then says that that it was him who shot eddie. He says that he had to sacrifice his knee in order to save his life. The captain then reveals that he died because he stepped on a landmine getting Eddie to safety, meaning he also made sacrifice.One his way out he advises Eddie to let go of his anger. The third stop is where he sees a vision of his father. He had flashbacks of the abuse he suffered from the hands of his father when he was drunk.then he meets Ruby who’s husband is the founder of Ruby Pier which was named after her. She offers him a new way to look at his father’s death. Eddie believed that his father died because he made a decision while drunk to jump into the freezing water and caught pneumonia, but really he was trying to save his friend mickey’s life. Mickey tried to kill himself after Eddie’s father caught him assaulting

She lets Eddie know even though he gambled all their money away she still loved him. Eddie resentful at himself for his wife’s early death, realizes that love lives forever. She tells him “Life has to end. Love doesn’t” (Albom 173). Finally Eddie reunites in heaven with Tala the young girl killed in the war. She explains to Eddie that she was the shadow he saw that was burned in the fire. “The nipa. Ina say be safe there. Wait for her. Be safe. The big noise. Big fire. You burn me” (Albom 187). She explains to Eddie he was meant to work at the Pier, to protect the

The Other Side of Paradise explores topics society refuses to speak about today. The author Staceyann Chin grows up as an outcast in Jamaica. The memoir begins with Chin at a very young age, her and her brother Delano both live with their grandma. Chin was left alone after being born by her mother and her father refuses to claim Chin as his own child. Throughout the memoir, Chin experiences sexism, classism, racism and strict religious standards. Furthermore, The Other side of Paradise, along with bell hook’s article, provides insight towards the roles of race and class, as we see in the memoirs characters, Staceyann and Delano.

     The next person that Eddie meets is his Sargent from the war. He tells Eddie about how he, the Sargent, died, and how that enabled the rest of the company to survive. He told Eddie that it had been him who had shot him, in order to save his life. Eddie had become convinced that he saw someone in a burning building, and to prevent Eddie from going in there and losing his life, the Sargent shot him in the leg.

Throughout the novel, Eddie also can be exemplified as a sympathetic character. sympathetic characters are when readers feel sympathy for throughout a story. The reader can feel empathy for Eddie, when the author describes the pain of Eddie’s gunshot wound. The pain was described to be unbearable and the description of the event of the gunshot pains a morbid picture in the reader’s mind. During Eddie’s time as a soldier in World War II, any reader can feel an astonishing amount of sympathy for Eddie. During, Eddie’s time as a soldier, he experienced, “A piercing pain ripped through Eddie's leg. He screamed a long, hard curse then crumbled to the ground. Blood was spewing below his knee. Plane engines roared. The skies lit in bluish flashes. He lay there, bleeding and burning, his eyes shut against the searing heat, and for the first time in his life, he felt ready to die,” (Albom 84). The reader can comprehend Eddies suffering and pain. Eddie was on the ground, in a war zone hurt and slowly dying. Readers can feel a lot of sympathy for when Eddie wanted to let go of the world and die. Before Eddie’s death, he ran under a falling amusement park ride to save a little girl, Eddie

Coincidences do not exist, and everything is connected. Actions may seem unimportant and inconsequential, but in reality, every action has a reaction on someone or something else. This fact is evident through the quote, “That there are no random acts. That we are all connected. That you can no more separate one life from another than you can separate a breeze from the wind” (Albom, 48). This quote appears in Mitch Albom’s novel, The Five People you Meet in Heaven, which explores the notion that every story is connected, even without knowing the person. This is displayed through The Blue Man’s death, Marguerite’s car crash, and Tala’s death. Actions, small or large, can effectuate an immense chain reaction.

The idea of survival is conveyed through character development in “The Five People You Meet In Heaven.” Survival is shown during the war, as Eddie has to go through fight after fight. According to the book, “The Five People You Meet In Heaven,” it states, “He learned the nervous cheer of a soldier’s first survived combat, when the men slap each other and smile as if it’s over - We can go home now! - and he learned the sinking depression of a soldier’s combat, when he realizes the fighting does not stop at one battle, there is more and more after that...” This shows that Eddie has to continue to endure all the battles, although he wants to go home. Since the war isn’t over, Eddie has to continue fighting in the war, and he has to continue to go through different problems of the war. Fighting and surviving in a war isn’t easy for him, as there’s an opposing side trying