When Louie Zamperini was young, he was considered a bad child, he would drink alcohol out of an old bottle, but color it white so it looked like he was drinking milk. He started smoking cigarettes at the age of 5 years old and he was a thief, he would steal from people and businesses anything that wasn’t nailed down and easy to grab. “I was a rotten kid. My excitement came from seeing what I could get away with.”(qtd. in brainyquote.com). His family was convinced he would be heading to prison until his brother Pete started encouraging him to run. He started breaking school records and that’s when he realized he had true potential. In the 1930s, he qualified for the Olympics in in Berlin he finished in 8th place, but he won over the crowd by setting the record of the fastest final lap. Although Louie forgot his promise he made with God, God never forgot the …show more content…
Only three men from the plane survived, left stranded floating on a raft where food and drinking water was very scarce and the heat was causing them to lose their minds. "Take me home alive and I will seek You and serve You my entire life."(qtd. in brainyquote.com). After he made that promise with God things slowly started to look up for Louie, Louie wrestled with a shark and he killed it which gave them all meat to eat to add some of the weight they have lost from not eating on the raft. One day a plane came flying over Louie and the others in the raft and began shooting at them, Louie and the others jumped in the water and hid under the raft hoping the plane wasn’t going to come back for more. Around the 30th day Mac one of the survivors from the plane crash died on the raft. Louie and Phillip wrapped up Mac’s body and pushed it out in the Pacific ocean. On the 47th day of surviving on the raft Louie and Phillips were picked up by a Japanese
On January 26th, 1917, Louie Zamperini was born to an immigrant Italian family that lived in New York. His family consisted of his mom (Louise), dad (Anthony), brother (Pete), and his two sisters (Sylvia and Virginia). In 1919 they decided to move to California and his father got a job as a railway electrician. As Louie got older he became more and more of a troublemaker. He would steal almost anything from the town. In the 1930’s eugenics started to take off in America. Louie realized that if he didn’t shape up his act, people would start targeting him. After Louie gets in trouble for sneaking kids into a basketball game, Pete convinces him to join track. This is when Louie starts outrunning what’s after him… literally.
Chapters 12–17 describe the days that Louie spent adrift, trying to survive in the vast Pacific Ocean. When his B-24 bomber crashed into the sea on May 27, 1943, only three men survived: Louie, his pilot Russell Allen “Phil” Phillips, and tail gunner Francis “Mac” McNamara. Over the next 46 days, they struggled to survive in two small, inflatable rafts while drifting across miles and miles of water.
Louie was able to survive in the raft because of his brother Pete, his Olympic experience and he was smart and papered, to a degree. Pete influenced his survival because before Louie joined the war Pete helped train him for the Olympics, when Pete pushed and encouraged him to never stop and to always keep his head up, which help Louie not give up on the raft and keep fighting for his life. The text states on pages 15, “from that day on Pete was all over Louie for him to train,” this proves that Pete pushed Louie, which thought Louie to never stop and to always keep going. The Olympic experience helped Louie survive because it thought him to take the pain and keep going. The text states on page 44, “…as he neared the final turn he saw a tiny
Initially, Zamperini was not fond of running, infact, Hillenbrand states, “Louie hated running, but the applause was intoxicating, and the prospect of more was just enough incentive to keep him marginally compliant” (chapter 2). It is explained that Zamperini didn’t like to run, but only ran for the joy of victory. With this quote alone we can infer that he would do whatever it took to win those races. As a matter of fact, later on in the book it is shown that he, indeed, did do whatever it took to win, “Louie trained so hard that he rubbed the skin right off of his toes and his socks were bloody” (chapter 3). This is showing he will do as much as he can to come out on top. With all of his hardwork and perseverance he finally did achieve his goal. Louie Zamperini went to the Olympics to race in the 5000-meter distant event. Even though he came in eighth, he had one of the fastest time on the last lap, 56 seconds. After working so hard to become what he has always dreamed, his battle was nowhere near
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.
Zamperini went through a lot in his life: the crash of the Green Hornet, being rescued from the sea, and the aftermath of the war. These events influenced his life greatly in many different ways. In the end, bad luck and good luck each influenced him at different points in his life, leaving him
Louie Zamperini was a barbaric boy who became a world famous track sensation, whom competed in the 1936 Berlin Olympics at the age of nineteen years old. Louis Zamperini was the youngest contestant in the 1936 Berlin Olympics. At the age of nineteen he struck the world with his running compassion and talent. Later Louie stepped back from his running career and converted into an Army Air Corps bombardier, turning his life around. After surviving his worst nightmare, he altered to a world wide famous runner, for the world thought “Zamperini dead” but pursuing them he is alive and stronger than ever. A #1 New York times bestseller, “Unbroken” is released by Laura Hillenbrand whom created an all time biography that tells the resolute and gallant life of and Louis Zamperini.
Louie kept fighting and believing in himself throughout the movie which portrays the archetype of warrior. In the beginning of the movie, Louie was qualified into the Olympics in Tokyo. When Louie was running a race, someone hit his shoe with their shoe spike. He slowed down because he was hurt, but his brother encouraged him to keep going in which Louie ran the fastest lap in history. Louie was taken down when he was competing, in which he lost faith. But his brother, Peter, helped in believe in himself to keep going and keep fighting so that he can do great things. Louie believed in himself and kept fighting which shows that Louie is a warrior. Again, Louie was taken down, but not by someone else. Towards the middle of the movie, when Louie was running against a Jap soldier at the prisoner camp to prove his Olympic ability (was organized by The Bird, a commander who was jealous of Louie), he fell down because he was so weak but he got back up to finish. Louie was tired and exhausted. He was weak. But Louie knew that he couldn’t give up know, he had to keep fighting. He got back up to show his strength, to show that he won’t stop and this identifies a warrior. Lastly, Louie showed his strength towards the end of the movie. At the
Louis Silvie Zamperini was born to Italian immigrant parents on January 26, 1917, in the town of Olean, New York. Growing up in Torrance, California, Zamperini ran track at Torrance High School and discovered that he had a competitive streak a mile wide when it came to long-distance running. In 1934, Zamperini set the national high school mile record, and his time of 4 minutes and 21.2 seconds would stand for an incredible 20 years. His track prowess also caught the attention of the University of Southern California, and he earned a scholarship to attend. It wasn’t long before Zamperini was taking his love of track to the next level, and in 1936 he headed to New York City for the 5,000-meter Olympic trials.
Louie grew up in a small town, he was a rebel child who stole things and started fights. All he wanted to do was run away because he always had his parents or his brother lecturing and yelling at him. However, Louie had a very special gift in which he never put to work. Thankfully for his brother, he got him back on track. Louie’s gift was running, he was so fast and could never stop. Louie continues to compete and break world records soon leading him to go to the olympics and he tries to break the world record of the timed mile. His career was stopped and taken over when the second world war two broke out, and he enters the army. He becomes a bombardier. On his first mission, a battle occurs between him and his captain, however they managed to land the plane safely. Then they are placed onto a new plane that eventually gets shot down, Louie was one out of three who survived. These three men had to figure out how to survive even though they were flustered about the whole situation. One ended up dying but Louie stayed strong and was fighting for his own food to survive. Everything was going smoothly, they were surviving for a pretty long time but it quickly shifted when the japanese find them. The Japanese shuttle Louie and his
Running allowed for the young Louie Zamperini to escape his trouble making past by showing him hope in the form of a future of acceptance. After his brother convinced the principal not to ban Louie Zamperini from all athletic and social activities, Mr Zamperini joined track because, “ Some girls began assembling a team for an interclass track meet… the girls worked their charms, and Louie found himself on the track.” This conveys that when Louie Zamperini found track he gained hope that he could have a future of acceptance from the people around him without having to cause trouble (Hillenbrand 15). This is in contrast to when he had smuggled people into sporting events using a key he found which made him popular with students but got him in trouble with the teachers. Since Zamperini craved attention and since he gained it through trouble, when he found a way to earn positive attention through running, Zamperini took it.
In the first half of the historical nonfiction novel, Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand, Louie Zamperini endures many hardships in his life. These struggles make me feel sorry for him and the trouble he is in. As a child, he was unable to fit in, his peers considered him “a bad kid”. Louie would unfortunately steal things on the streets, and consistently get into fights with others, commonly for no reason at all. However, the positive side to his actions, was the speed and running ability he built up. I felt relieved when his brother encouraged his participation on the school track team. In a nutshell, Louie was a natural star. His large, skinny frame and long frame gave him ideal running characteristics. No longer was Louie a bad kid, he was a
Succumbing to hunger and thirst on the fifth day, they killed the dog for nourishment. Two of the crewmen died on the sixth day. On the seventh, the remaining crew reached land.
War can be loud and visible or quiet and remote. It affects the individual and entire societies, the soldier, and the civilian. Both U.S. prisoners of war in Japan and Japanese-American citizens in the United States during WWII undergo efforts to make them “invisible.” Laura Hillenbrand’s Unbroken hero, Louie Zamperini, like so many other POWs, is imprisoned, beaten, and denied basic human rights in POW camps throughout Japan. Miné Okubo, a U.S. citizen by birth, is removed from society and interned in a “protective custody” camp for Japanese-American citizens. She is one of the many Japanese-Americans who were interned for the duration of the war. Louie Zamperini, as a POW in Japan, and Miné Okubo, as a Japanese-American Internee both experience efforts to make them “invisible” through dehumanization and isolation in the camps of WWII, and both resist these efforts.
In the biography Unbroken, by Laura Hillenbrand, a troubled adolescent boy named Louis Zamperini revolves his life around his running career. Starting at such a young age, running had many impacts on Louie’s life. The high demand of training kept Louie distracted from making unintelligent choices he had previously been making. Running changed the young teenager he was and the man he was going to become.