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Yes, what is the what? What kind of question is that? It's so baffling, I almost want to ask, how is that question? Furthermore, what grounds does caucasian Eggers have for writing about a black man in the middle of a Sudanese civil war? The title alone of Egger's most popular novel reads like a code. You'd have to be a rock to not at least want to flip through the pages to get a whiff of understanding.
After reading the whole damn thing, it turns out the question/title itself has less to do with the race and location of the protagonist, than it does with the fact that he has a choice: stay within Africa and face deadly conflict, or leave to an unknown. The What, it seems, is not only the concept of opportunity, but also abandonment of what is familiar. In the heat and tumult of conflict between the Sudanese government and the Sudan People's Liberation Army, the citizens of Sudan and nearby countries are pitted with the choice of either remaining where they are, or fleeing to somewhere else--in many cases, remaining put means committing suicide. Arab mercenaries, a powerful and corrupt government, and the merciless heat and wildlife of Africa do not seem to spare those who decide not to run away.
Like most novels by Eggers, this story does not move quickly. I would love to read this in a class rather than read it on my own. The book is 535 pages of violence, history and personal narrative told to us by the part fictional, part autobiographical protagonist, Valentino Deng. The story of his escape from Africa is framed within the story of his adaptation to America. It's a heart-cleaving narrative in which Deng's loneliness and helplessness are palpable.
You will want to step into the pages and help Deng with things non-immigrants have the privilege of doing with relative ease: seeking help from the police, getting medical attention, getting into school, getting a job, getting married, being noticed when something goes wrong.
Much of the novel takes place on a long, perilous walk from Sudan all the way to Kakuma (which is fucking far). You witness starvation, thirst, death by lions, death by exhaustion, death by madness and death by simple submission. This alone will make any reader look up from the page and think, "Thank god I was born here in Blahblasville, CT." Egger's portrait of death in this story it worth reading, for the shear simplicity in how he explains the tremendous weight of losing someone when all there is left of hope is someone nearby who will shake you when you start to lose it:
"His eyes slowly closed and I ran to get our share of the animal. While I was gone, the life in William K fell away and his flesh returned to the earth.
It was easier to die now... I had assumed that dying always took place over those many hours in the dark. But William K had done something different. He only stopped walking, sat under a truee, closed his eyes, and was gone. I had returned with a finger's worth of meat to share with him and found his body already cold... I sat next to him for some time. In my hand his hand became warm again... I knew the vultures would be circling... I decided I would bury him, even if it meant that I would lose my place with the group... I no longer had any faith in our journey or in our guides... we would walk and die until all boys were gone" (217)
It's a lot of ink to get through, but simply by comparison, Eggers' invention and recording of this refugee's story gives us a lot of time to realize we have it pretty good.
It's not all sad, thankfully. It's not outright hilarious, but there is humor. As a boy, Valentino's father explains to him that they, the Dinka, are superior to the Arabs. This becomes interesting when the Deng family has several Arabs over for dinner. Valentino loses a small but potent bit of innocence when he thinks, "[My father] was sure that the Arabs knew they were inferior to the Dinka, but he knew it would not be polite to explain this to them at dinner" (63). It's not far from what we might find in a small suburb in Connecticut: The Jones's have the Carter family over for dinner, all the while, Ms. Jones smiles widely, knowing that Mr. Carter has a penchant for seducing the local swim instructor, and that Ms. Carter simply pretends to not smell the chlorine in his hair. Ms. Jones may blab to her other friends, and to the grocer, and the crossing guard if there's time, but at dinner, she's mum. Call her a superficial gossip, but never a bad host. Valentino's father reminds me of my fictional Ms. Jones in this way, and it's delightful. If you want to get through a book weighted down with genocide and children being eaten by lions, you have to look hard for the humor that wiggles between the lines, rather than wait for it to dance across the page. Noticing it when it's harder to see, I find, is more rewarding.
However, I definitely needed more of it.
What Eggers does most obviously well is illustrate the odd consequences of freedom. Valentino struggles for his freedom throughout the entire novel, but whenever he achieves one level of it, he is burdened still with the responsibility of having to choose what to do with it. Being freed from any kind of prison, emotional or physical, leaves us with the responsibility to do well in it. Eggers creates a narrative that forces us to examine freedom as a blessing and as a demon howling its catch in our ear.
3 out of 5 stars
