Response: “Choose a representative passage from this novel that holds particular significence to you. Type it in and comment on its significance.”

Response to the instruction, “Choose a representative passage from this novel that holds particular significence to you. Type it in and comment on its significance.”

The selected passage is from Peace Child page 240-242; I will only type up some parts of the passage, but the full passage includes all the text in between the first and last ones I typed (italicized text is the quoted parts of the passage, though without quotation marks):

Memories began to flood back, memories that drew me aside into a narrow path branching toward the Tumdu.
I followed the path until it ended on the crest of a knoll of high ground beside the still river. I stared down at the dew-wet kunai grass around me, remembering the two men who lay buried beneath it. Two men whom I learned to love very deeply. Two men who in their life-time had often looked into me with a closeness of understanding rare on earth...
…
Aeons of change had metamorphosed us both until we appeared totally alien to each other. Yet providence had brought us together again. Why? To demonstrate that Christ is the Fulfiller of every man's true self.
I turned slowly from the two unmarked graves and walked along the grassy edge of the Tumdu. Peace seemed to be everywhere and in everything. It was flowing down with the moonlight, twinkling through the stars, shimmering among reflections. I vibrated through birdcalls and Amhwi's now distant voice.
It brought back the memory of another voice which, though now hushed in death, still echoed out of that very different world from which we had come: the firm, commissioning voice of an old, white-haired man:
“You will encounter customs and beliefs which will baffle you, but which must be understood....
“Our Lord is impatient to establish His kingdom of love in those dark places which are now the habitation of cruelty....
“Who will go?”
I remembered how my whole being had responded with a sureness that would tolerate no other option: “I will!”
I reached for the gate, and as I touched it, joy swept through me. Joy more than just my own.

This passage's significance for me is what I might describe (though maybe inadequately) as a beautiful way to conclude the book (apart from the postscript and epilogue, that is). I just find the passage pleasing as the final part of the story. I might even be able to empathize, even if I had not experienced what Don Richardson did at the moment, to some extent the sense of a great joy (and, perhaps, if the word is appropriate, delight) at the peace in the now transformed Sawi people. I also find the recollection of the past quite beautiful in this passage. Perhaps it is so because of similar reasons why reminiscent things cause yearning as well as delight – though I'm not exactly sure if I am capable of giving even a roughly accurate analysis of it – as I now can sympathize with Don Richardson after having gone through his story.

Perhaps the sympathizing and maybe even empathizing can be attributed to one, the Christian faith I share with Don Richardson, and two, my reading of more than half of the book (and most of the portion that involved Don Richardson) in a relatively condensed time – by which I mean, I spent much of a shorter period of time to finish that portion rather than reading smaller segments over a longer period of time. Having the previous parts of the story not so distant, perhaps I was able to sympathize with the part that mentioned memories.
In short, I find this passage as a pleasant part of Peace Child.

Work Cited

Richardson, Don. Peace Child: An Unforgettable Story of Primitive Jungle Treachery in the 20th Century. 4th. Regal, 2005. 240-242. Print.