LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Long Walk to Freedom, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Racism and Division
Negotiation, Democracy, and Progress
Nonviolent Protest vs. Violent Protest
The Value of Optimism
Summary
Analysis
One day, to his surprise, Mandela and the others aren’t taken to the quarry but instead to a beach to collect seaweed. The work is surprisingly difficult, but the atmosphere on the shore is more relaxed. They even collect clams, mussels, and crayfish to make a kind of stew.
The stew that the prisoners make out of scraps on the beach is a sign of their resilience and how, like Mandela, many of these prisoners are determined to keep up their spirits over the course of their imprisonment.