Beasts of No Nation, by Uzodinma Iweala (John Murray: London, 2005).

Beasts of No Nation is the kind of war story that will capture your heart and mind. Relentlessly graphic and viscerally brutal, it contrasts horrific violence against the innocence of childhood, achieving an unequalled emotional impact. The author, Uzodinma Iweala, is a 23-year old Nigerian who grew up in Washington DC and studied at Harvard University, far from the killing fields of West Africa. Yet his experience in working with former child soldiers makes his novel read more like an eyewitness account. While the reader cannot help but become emotionally involved in Iweala’s urgent depiction of horrible suffering, the novel portrays little real-world detail or history, and fails to fully explore the broader causes or consequences of the use of child soldiers.

Beasts begins with an evocative quotation from Rimbaud about suppressing “human hope” and becoming “like a wild animal.” As the title suggests, the major theme of this work is the transformation from human to beast. The novel begins with an African child narrating his discovery by rebels – the reader doesn’t even know the boy’s name, let alone anything about the preceding events. This gives the reader a sense of the child’s confusion. The first thing most readers will notice is the unique, clipped style, lacking in plurals or the definite article, which is childish as well as suggesting dialect. The unfamiliar style avoids cliché and allows striking images, for example “a voice that is just touching my body like knife.” (p. 1) The unusual rhythm, shot through with awkward verbs like “angrying,” defines its own flow.

The opening pages have a stunning impact, throwing the reader into the middle of the action, forcing them to feel what Agu feels. Agu, threatened by the rebel Commandant, is so traumatised by seeing his father gunned down that he can barely remember his own name. Asked to become a soldier, images of Hollywood films and pre-war parades are his only idea of what he is agreeing to. It seems that the literally ragged company of rebels are desperate for recruits, and with nowhere to go, Agu has little choice about joining. But while the pre-teen boy is initially unwilling to kill, when he is forced to execute a captured government officer, he experiences a disturbing sense of power and release, even arousal. “I am growing hard between my leg” (p. 26)

As we learn more about Agu’s background, we can trace his tragic transformation. A precocious and intelligent child, he had a happy family background. He wanted to attend university, perhaps becoming a doctor or engineer. Agu’s scientific streak is apparent in descriptions of him observing and classifying trees, or noting the environmental impact of the rebel camp. Not only is this a reminder of how war wastes human potential, Agu’s intelligence makes his more profound thoughts plausible. He struggles to reconcile his desire to kill with his Christian beliefs, and wonders what being a soldier really means – is he really a soldier, since he has no uniform?

The first major raid described in the book is an unfortunately typical scenario in African civil wars, each side competing to inflict civilian suffering. Horrifically, Agu and his friend Strika hack to death a mother and daughter. The Commandant had previously explained the neatly symmetrical moral reasoning behind the attack: “We will be killing them like they are killing us and we will be stealing from them what they are stealing from us.” (p. 53) The rebels, high on “gun juice,” obey unquestioningly. Later in the war, Agu is attempting to relax in a jungle camp. An unexpectedly graphic detail is the way the blood of victims gets onto the food they loot. Terror and guilt affects Agu – he feels “inside out,” as if his “mind is becoming rotten like the inside of fruit.” (p. 108) The cycle of violence repeats itself as Agu is raped by the Commandant, and in turn rapes victims during rebel attacks. This illustrates the self-perpetuating effects of involving children in violence. The ending provides a spark of hope, however, as the soldiers mutiny against the unstable Commandant, and Agu’s friend Strika dies. Without the Commandant and the other child in the company, Agu is without a family once more. Racked by guilt, he escapes and is taken in by humanitarian workers, to whom he describes his transformation from man to beast, concluding almost defiantly “I am also having mother once, and she is loving me” (p. 177)

According to Alex de Waal, the deliberate recruitment of children is “a wholly new phenomenon which promises to change radically the nature of warfare.” Amnesty International estimates that 300,000 child soldiers, some younger than 10 years old, are involved in over 30 conflicts, from Colombia to Nepal. The deep trauma and long-term social consequences make child soldiers one of the worst humanitarian issues, and Iweala’s novel draws attention to this forgotten crisis.

However, Beasts’ only failing is that it doesn’t examine the general causes or consequences of the use of child soldiers. Examining contemporary African conflicts, de Waal discovered that children made obediently brutal soldiers, willing to hack off hands or execute prisoners with little knowledge of the consequences . They were also cheap to recruit, since many were orphans with no way of supporting themselves. For this reason, starting in 1990s Liberia, commanders actually deliberately recruited children, and organised children-only units. This is very different to the depiction in Beasts, where there are just two children out of about 120 rebels. Also, Agu swings a machete, although presumably he has little upper-body strength. One important factor enabling children to fight in modern wars is the light weight and ease of use of rifles. Perhaps it would be more realistic – but less gory – to arm Agu with a Kalashnikov? It will only be possible to fight the problem of child soldiers if the wider context is understood, and so sources other than Iweala should be considered for background on the subject.

Uzodinma Iweala’s Beasts of No Nation, with its resonating emotional power and urgent call for compassion, is important in giving voice to the voiceless children of war, and in providing a more personal insight into the problem of child soldiers. However, readers interested in the topic should look elsewhere for political analysis, realistic details or potential solutions, which are all beyond the scope of this novel.

Posted by Phil on Friday, October 20th, 2006 at 10:25 pm.