Wednesday, January 2, 2008

Ben Carson Character Description

Ben Carson is a major character in Gifted Hands. He narrates the true story of his life which includes hardships, trials and tribulations, but overall triumph. In the first chapter of the book, Ben is eight years old, and is undergoing his childhood with his mother Sonya and his brother Curtis. We see that in the first chapter he loses his father as it was found out that his father was not faithful to his mother, and thus Sonya separates and divorces from him. As is expected, Ben, who was still young and immature, does not see why his father had to leave. Protected from his mother as to the reason his parents have separated, he desperately wants his father back. Soon, however, he learns that although they are poorer, life is subsequently better without their father, and Ben eventually stops thinking about it.

Ben, without a father, has to go through a rough time both at school and at home. He started out at the bottom of the food chain, so to speak, in his class. He was seen as the dunce, but never cried or gave up, he just saw himself as mediocre. In chapter four, his grades began to improve after he was given glasses. On seeing his grades go from failing to Ds, his mother was still not pleased. But suddenly Ben had a new emotion, determination and hope. He realized he could do it. His mother pushed and motivated him to do well and through more studying, he soon became one of the smartest students. Ben soon became open-minded and motivated.

We also learn throughout the first five chapters in the book that Ben was easily influenced, although this was not always a good thing. When he was being “capped” on, we see that he, although trying to be defensive, really he felt left out and rejected. He desperately wanted to be accepted, as any child would want to be. We see that he gave into peer pressure, and began capping on other people. Soon, he was the best of the lot of them, and began pressuring his mother for material items, to be one of the cool children. However, when Ben begins to be one of the cool kids, and his grades begin to drop, he was not very happy. He had strayed from the important values in his life, Christ and fulfilling his dreams.

Through a mixture of downfalls and uprisings, Ben turns into the man we know today. We learn from Ben that we can do anything if we fact our minds to it and give it our best.