Unbroken, By Louie Zamperini

During Louie’s time at the POW camp, one guard, called the Bird, was out to get him. Louie showed resilience in this trouble by speaking up to avoid getting himself and others hurt.

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

TOPIC- Louie learned resilience, and with that he learned how to feed himself in order to live through the harsh conditions of the prisoner of war camps and the open ocean.

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

Chapters 18-33 describe Louie’s years at many different POW camps in Japanese territories. During his time on Kwajalein Island Louie is imprisoned in a solitary wooden cell that was infested with maggots, flies and mosquitos. Louie is often beaten, interrogated and humiliated. He is deprived of food, water, and any sort of medical care after he feels ill. Louie is then transferred to different POW camps and eventually ends up with Mutsuhiro Watanabe as his guard.

They were then hit with a gun, blindfolded and thrown into a Japanese boat. The Japanese then test biochemicals on Phil and Louie, they survived. Louie and Phil are then moved to a Prisoner of War camp in Yokohama. As soon as they land, Sasaki (the Japanese friend from USC) greets them as the camp leader.”The man turned, and Louie saw his face” (Hillenbrand 3003). Phil is separated from Louie and is transported to Ashio. When he landed he became friends with Gaga the Duck. Louie is declared dead on 28 May 1944. Gaga gets sexually abused and then killed by a Japanese guard. “Shithead opened his pants and violated the bird” (Hillenbrand 3559). Months later, Louie is moved to another POW camp called Omori. On arrival, Louie is beaten by the head guard Watanabe (the Bird). “There was a rush in the air, the

After conquering horrific tragedies during World War Two, Louie Zamperini commented, “I didn’t know it then, but my persistence, perseverance, and unwillingness to accept defeat when things looked all but hopeless were part of the very character traits I would need to make it through World War II alive.” (Hillenbrand, FIGURE OUT IF AND WHERE IT IS IN THE BOOK.) In Laura Hillenbrand’s book Unbroken, he showed absolute determination to survive insurmountable obstacles. Throughout his life and everything he endured, he was determined he was going to make it through. In fact, Louie decided he would be whatever he put his mind to. If he was going to run, then by golly he was going to run, and if he wanted to make it out of a POW camp, then

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

The 3 struggled at sea trying to survive and Mac unfortunately died at sea. Louie and Phill survived forty six days at sea, but were then captured and taken to a Japanese P.O.W. camp. The men are shuffled from camp to camp, each getting worse than the last, until the war ends. Louie survived, even though he was pursued by the barbarous guard known as "The Bird", who mentally and physically broke

Louie was determined for the bird not to break him. Though all of Louie's humiliation, he kept determined to keep his dignity. When Louie first became a POW he was pressured to give the Japanese information about the United States. Even when the Japanese bribed Louie he was determined to not betray him country.

With an additional nine other men on board, nobody had expected the plane to crash into the middle of the ocean; “An instant before the plane struck the water, Louie’s mind throbbed with a single, final thought: Nobody's going to live through this” (125). Somehow after 47 days stranded, unfortunately, with an injured pilot and a panicking tail gunner, Louie and Phil managed to survive. Being rescued only left them in more trouble than when they had crashed, as being captured by the Japanese had turned around on the duo, making them become POWs for two years. Life up to this point seemed to be getting worse, only having the hope that the war was coming to an end, Louie met the biggest obstacle he had ever encountered; a man named Mutsuhiro Watanabe, affectionately named “The Bird” by the POWs who’d known him. This Imperial Japanese Army Sergeant was one of the worst people to be situated with while being a POW.

Running was the only thing that brought Louie happiness after his appalling time in the Pacific and Japan. Regrettably, Louie had sustained several injuries from his time in the POW camps, including dysentery and ankle injury. Upon his arrival back to the states, Louie was sent to be examined by doctors. The doctors told Louie that because of his injury, his running career was over. Louie, asked later by a reporter about his running career, said: “It’s finished, I’ll never run again.” (pg. 323) This was a difficult and emotional announcement for Louie as it marked the end of Louie’s happiness. Nevertheless, Louie decided to try and run again. Even with his ankle and leg injuries, Louie ran a mile in just 4:18 minutes. As Louie ran on, his enjoyment for the activity depreciated. One day, while Louie was running a two mile, he felt a sharp pain in his ankle in the same place that it was injured in the POW camp Naoetsu. Louie, distraught, continued running until he made it to the finish line. A doctor confirmed that Louie had brought back his war injury and could likely no longer run. This distinctly marked the end of any running career Louie had. Louie, no longer able to run, fell into a deeper depression. Luckily enough, Louie learned to come to peace with his war experiences and inability to run, ending his depression and permitting him a harmonious life. Louie even ran in the 1988 Winter Olympics, holding the

27- Life is good with the Bird gone. Well, as good as life in a POW camp can get. Bill Harris is transferred to Omori, but he still has trouble with his memory after repeated beatings at the hands of the Quack. In February, an air battle breaks out over Omori, and the Japanese planes are decimated. The Americans bomb Tokyo, and Louie is to be transferred to another POW camp.

Around the same time as trying to make the Olympics, Louie was enrolled in World War 2. However, Louie still trained when he had free time during the war; running along cars to push him to go faster. Louie was sent on missions during the war that were both battles fought in the air and search missions. During one of his search missions, he encountered near death experiences, such as ditching out of the Green Hornet when the engines started to fail. Even though surviving the plane crash was extraordinary, surviving hunger and thirst for 47 days adrift in a raft with two other people is even more strange. The possibility of surviving that long without proper supplies is extremely low and proves that reality is both more intense and stranger than

Louie was beaten and tortured in the hellish Japanese POW camps that made prisoners such as Louie feel dehumanized but Louie wasn’t frail and didn’t let the Japanese guards destroy him. To recap, Louie fought in World War II and crashed in a bomber plane. Louie miraculously survived the crash and the ocean and lived of of albatross and fish in the ocean for about one and a half months and then got captured by the Japanese where Louie had to be moved to a Japanese POW camp where Louie lived in squalor for 2 years. In the novel Unbroken, Written by Laura Hillenbrand, Louie had many skills that helped him survive including being rebellious and courageous.