Mitch Albom's The Five People You Meet In Heaven

The lesson learned in this novel is to look back in your life and see what you did to make yourself and the people around you happier and to make the community a place wanted to live in for the people. The theme of this book is forgiveness. This is because at the beginning of the book Eddie is separate from most people. When his death arrives he looks back and sees what all he has done where other people have been sent to heaven due to him. For example, the captain forgives Eddie for stepping on a landmine. Also, Marguerite has no anger towards Eddie and has always loved him and always

Eddie steals a purse from an elderly lady. Manny was given a second chance by the black man. “In that instant of trying to call out to Eddie everything changed. It was like I’d seen my own fate.” (210) Manny said this because he realized that he is on the completely wrong path in life. Manny realizes that Eddie is starting to pick up character traits like his father and Manny cannot turn out to be like his own dad. Manny knows that he does not want to throw away his life so he turns it around because he knows what the outcome will be if he does not change.

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

Eddie at the beginning of the story was hopeful that his career would succeed.Everything started going well for him, people said he played from the heart. He was starting to show that he had money, he got a leather jacket and and wore a chain. He made 1 record that went to the charts. When he went to hollywood he met a girl immediately and moved in with her. Not only that she taught him how to play the guitar which started his music career.Eddie started to become successful however when the A&R man told him that he doesn't hear a single. His music career was basically over, he had no idea what to do, he was confused. He was lost, he had no career when his A&R man fired him, he is “a rebel without a

Eddie was born into a broken home without a strong father figure in Harlem on one of the worst streets in the town. There were already so many people judging him because of his race and where he was brought up. For a short time, Eddie chose to fulfill a more meaningful future instead of dwelling on his race, but ultimately, he decided to let the stereotypes of his race define him. As time went on at Exeter, Eddie learned firsthand what others thought of him and his race he quickly learned that “[w]hen you’re black, and you’re in a white prep school, control is the paramount thing in your life. You have to be in control - you can’t give anything away, especially how you are really feeling” (Anson 205).

     The lesson that the Sargent had to teach Eddie was about sacrifice. “Sometimes when you sacrifice something precious you’re not really losing it, you’re just passing it on to someone else.” (94) In other words, the Sargent sacrificed Eddie’s leg to save his life, and he also sacrificed his life in order to preserve the lives of his

Purity is what Eddie comes to feel in heaven; He is cleansed of his sin. With the combination of purity and innocence that is symbolized by both the water and the cleansing of Tala in the river, Eddie is taught to forgive. Correspondingly, this is Eddie’s fifth lesson he learns in heaven. This absolution is what Eddie has needed his whole life. Eddie feels like the fact that all he’s done with his life is work as maintenance at Ruby Pier is simply not up to his full

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

Eddie learned a lot about his life in heaven. He learned from Captain about sacrifice. At a young age Eddie joined the army and fought for the rights and freedom of his country and would sacrifice his life to do so. During the end of his career in the military Eddy was on a mission to burn down some huts. The orders were followed and as he was watching the last hut burn he saw a shadow dart across the door that entered the hut. He sat there and heard bomber planes getting closer and closer to his location but he kept seeing the shadow dart all over the hut. He told his captain that there was someone in the hut and insisted on going in there and saving who was ever in there as he went to run in the hut his caption shot him in the leg and saved him from the fire and the bomber

Each person that Eddie meets has had an effect on him in some way, he just did not realize it at the time. Albom conveys the message that one's actions impacts somebody else’s life indirectly by using imagery and symbolism. Throughout the novel, Albom develops the message that one’s actions effects somebody’s life by using

This causes us to resonate with Eddie’s feelings of desperation and anguish that he is being told he is something he is not. Miller makes the audience sympathise with Eddie because he worked hard to help the cousins even though they weren’t his own children. This is shown when he says ‘I put a roof over their heads and

The Captain explains to Eddie that he did not shoot his leg for nothing. He was trying to stop him from killing himself by going into the fire to save a little girl who may or may not have been there. He teaches Eddie that sometimes it is necessary to make small sacrifices if it means helping someone else, and later on those choices should not be regretted. The lesson of sacrifice causes Eddie to become enraged, but also makes him realize that the Captain had good intentions and was actually trying to save him. The book supports statement by saying, “He felt a welling of something inside him that he had not felt in many years: a fierce, surging flood of anger, and a desire to hurt something” (Albom 86).

He also believed that no one deserved to be left behind and the Captain’s character was a great representation of responsibility. Sacrifice is similar to the first lesson of interconnectivity, sacrificing: time,power,money and or safety, for something greater than the needs of one, is the very embodiment of sacrifice and a major cornerstone of social responsibility The inclusion of a character Eddie already knew and respected once again proved the point of how the actions and sacrifices of others directly affect the lives of

Eddie’s father was an abusive alcoholic. He was also a maintenance worker at Ruby pier. Joe is Eddie’s brother. Marguerite is Eddie’s wife that died from a brain tumor. Marguerite’s death devastated Eddie.

Although Eddie does not use this lesson while in heaven, it brings him to better understand many of the sacrifices that he made while still on earth. As the Captain tells Eddie about sacrifices in life, he says, “‘You made one. I made one. We all make them. But you were angry over yours. You kept thinking about what you lost,’” (Albom 93). Many of the moments in Eddie’s life, going to war, standing up to his father, quitting school, and choosing to take care of his mother after his father’s death, all involve Eddie making a sacrifice. When the events are taking place, he believes that his sacrifices are something to regret, as many others do. Eddie uses each of these occurrences in his lifetime as an excuse for why he did not reach his