Left To Tell Literary Analysis

Words: 415
Pages: 2

Forgiveness can be hard to give. Some people are stubborn and do not think anyone deserves it, but forgiveness can allow us some peace. In Left to Tell by Immaculee Ilibagiza, Immaculee is caught in a ruthless genocide between the Hutus and Tutsi. We read about her growing relationship with God while hiding from the killings going on around her. Immaculee uses first-person point of view to demonstrate that even after times of grave injustice, forgiveness will give you peace. Immaculee is faced with the struggle of realizing that it is her neighbors that are going after her family, but Immaculee stands tall and prays for them. “No, these were my neighbors, people I’d grown up and gone to school with.” (77) . By adding that they were people she knew, Immaculee just shows how much harder it will be for her to forgive. “I knew I couldn’t ask God to love me if I were unwilling to love his children. At that moment, I prayed for the killers, for their …show more content…
“Don’t you think that it’s good-exactly what we Hutus should be doing?” (85) This characterizes Sembeba as an unforgiving cruel person. He only thinks about the past disagreements between the tribes, and bases their character off of past Tutsi. This makes him seem foolish and unsympathetic, mainly because he knows the people being persecuted. “But as fearful as I was, I had to fight the urge to stand up and yell at him-his words made me so angry.”Immacule maybe a forgiving person, but even for her forgiveness is hard to achieve. This passage shows the vengeful side of Immaculee because she uses the words “yell” “angry” and “fight”. “I prayed that one day he would find God’s truth and forgiveness.”(134) Again, Immaculee overcomes and prays for forgiveness. She knows that forgiveness will bring her