Laura Hillenbrand Unbroken Theme

Louie Zamperini is the type of person that has been through a lot of pain and happiness, making Louie much more complex of a person than most people. Louie is a person who started off as mischievous and then turned that into power for running, and won a lot races breaking records. He went to join the Air Force for the army, and then one day his plane crashed into the ocean and only him and 2 others survived the crash. He was next the found by the Japanese and was sent to a POW camp, and was a victim of many war crimes. The book “Unbroken ” by Laura Hillenbrand, shows Louie’s two character traits that most defines Louie are tenacious and fractious.

It was apparent, throughout the story, that Louie was a survivor. There were countless events throughout the story in which Louie´s ability to survive is seen clearly. One of these occurred when Louie clocked the fastest time for the mile in NCAA history. Louie was able to do this despite being spiked, clubbed, and trapped from moving forward in the race. This is apparent when Hillenbrand writes, “He burst through, blew past the race leader, and, with his shoe torn open, shins streaming blood, and chest aching, won easily”(44). Another example of his survival trait appearing strongly in the story occurred in the raft. After lying in a raft for weeks, Louie was still

At the beginning of his life, Louie’s delinquent behavior led to him barely escaping the eugenicists of the cull. In

In Unbroken, the text says, “He found himself thinking of Pete, and of something that he had said as they had sat on their bed years earlier: A lifetime of glory is worth a moment of pain. Louie thought: Let

Louie shows perseverance in the Olympic race. Hillenbrand writes, “In terrible pain, he took a staggering step off the track …he had no resistance to offer. Still he ran on” (Hillenbrand 26). This shows his perseverance because although Louie is in pain, he did not give up. Instead he kept running, enduring through his pain. Hillenbrand mentions, “But he had nothing to lose. He trained so hard that he rubbed the skin right off one of his toes, leaving his sock bloody” (Hillenbrand 23). Louie trained so hard that his skin had rubbed off. This shows Louie’s perseverance because even though he felt pain, he did not stop training because he was determined to win the Olympic race.

This caused in him a feeling in which he had never felt before, and thus inspired him to new things to get himself more aquatinted with God:

Michael J. Fox said, “One’s dignity may be assaulted, vandalized, and cruelly mocked, but it can never be taken away unless it is surrendered.” In Laura Hillenbrand’s novel Unbroken, the author tells the story of the main character Louie’s life. Growing up, Louie always had a strong mind. He became a well known track star and with the pressure of running, he never gives up what he was passionate about. Louie Zamperini suffers through a difficult time as a POW, yet he is able to gain back his dignity by having stubborn optimism and a tenacious will to survive.

During the seminar, someone asked: “Was Louie truly unbroken throughout the book?” Although this book was titled Unbroken, I believe the protagonist Louie had the spirit of being unbroken but didn’t stay unbroken throughout the book. First of all, one example of Louie having the unbroken spirit was when he was told to hold the six foot beam by the Bird. When Louie was slowly sliding into unconsciousness holding the beam, he thought: “He cannot break me” (302). Malnutrition, sickness, and other physical conditions were possessed by Louie that day, but he somehow managed to hold the beam for 37 minutes. However, Louie did not stay unbroken throughout the novel. Furthermore, the author lets us see the ‘broken Louie’ in Part V. In the beginning

In the biography, Unbroken, by Laura Hillenbrand, a young boy named Louis Zamperini’s life revolved around running and training for the Olympics. Running had a huge impact on his life and ended up changing how he would act. In his early days, Louis was an irresponsible and rebellious kid. Running would later force him to buckle down and focus on running and training. Many people influenced Louis, but only one made the biggest impact on his life. That person is Pete Zamperini, Louis’ older brother.

As a young boy, Louie Zamperini is a major troublemaker in his hometown of Torrance, California. He steals food and runs away. Pete, his older brother, helps Louie by training him and help develop his love for running after getting into trouble one too many times. Louie trains non-stop and breaks many school and state records. He gets so good that he is able to try out to be a 5000 meter olympian. Louie makes it to the Olympic Games in Berlin in 1936. Unfortunately, his running career suddenly ends as World War Two begins. Louie enlists in the air corps, and he becomes a bombardier. He and his crew bond through training and battles and going to an island where his crewmates help him keep up his training by driving next to him in a car to keep

Everyone encounters obstacles in life that they feel like they can't overcome. People that have 'resilience' can take these challenges head on, stay calm in any situation, and use their problem-solving skills to take advantage of the situation and get themselves out of it. In a section of "Unbroken" by Laura Hillenbrand, a biography of war hero Louie Zamperini, Zamperini is adrift at sea after his bomber crashed in the ocean. He is left with just the remains of the plane and two others, Phil and Mac. Louie Zamperini's key characteristics of resilience and the differences between all three men allow them to overcome adversity, and Louie and Phil make it out alive.

Consequently, Louie looked up to his brother Pete, who almost never got in trouble: ‘’Pete never got caught’’ (8). Pete had been in athletics, and wanted Louie to join also; in an incident involving Louie letting people into a basketball game for free, the principal banned Louie from athletics for a time: ‘’When basketball season began, there was an inexplicable discrepancy between the number of ten-cent tickets sold and the considerably larger number of kids in the bleachers’’ (13). When Pete talked to the coach, he convinced the principal to give Louie another chance. This event had an enormous impact on Louie’s life. Once joining track, he used his determination to do good in school so that he could participate in the sport. Determination in his sports life led Louie to evolve as a man, and make him a genuinely hard worker. This hard work and determination would later lead him to the Olympics in Germany, working hard like a man getting revenge and using all his tools to get to his goal. This occurred before World War 2, so the conflict would not begin until later on. This moment could be considered another crucial part in Louie’s life, as the event foreshadows the war that would lead Louie to become stranded in the Pacific Ocean and later tortured as a

He burst through, sprinted to the lead…” (43). Although Louie was being beat up and tore down by the others, he still sprinted to the finish and he did not allow himself to lose which shows how he was insistent in winning. On page 105, Louie, Phil and Mac were on the rafts and “Louie was assessing the rafts when Mac suddenly began wailing, ‘Were going to die!’ Louie tried to reassure him” (105). This demonstrates how Louie was determined to survive on this raft and how he is capable of transferring his insistence onto others and spreading the motivation of never failing.

JFK quickly became a imagine of true heroism in society after the United States was revealed to the event of the PT Motor Torpedo 109 crash. The boat was split in half by the Japanese destroyer Amagiri, in the middle of the night. He gathered and motivate the survivors from the PT 109 to swim to an island. Most of the crew members had severe burns and injuries. He tried to aid as many of the men that he could, but without proper supplies all they could do was hope for rescue. Some local Native Indians discovered the lost crew and informed the American Base lieutenant of the misfortunate events. The boys were found and brought back to the base to get proper medical care. Kennedy was advised to return back to America but protested and continued

Despite JFK’s efforts to maneuver the PT-109 out of its way, the much bigger Japanese destroyer hit the PT-109 and split it down the middle. Although this cause multiple fatalities immediately, many of JFK’s crew were able to abandon ship before the flames of their burning ship consumed them. JFK, being the great swimmer that he is, lead his crew to an island that was miles away. Many of his crew were badly injured, and for the men that could not swim the distance, JFK attached a life jacket around them and swam them with the strap in his mouth to the island. After reaching the island, a few natives found JFK and his crew. JFK carved a message in a coconut and requested that the natives go find them help. One day later JFK and his remaining crew were rescued, making John F. Kennedy a hero and earning him the Navy and Marine Corps Medal for his courage and leadership. Joe Kennedy Jr. flew dangerous missions around Europe during the war, and one year after JFK’s brush with death, Joe Jr. died when his plane exploded.