Closing Thoughts

The final event for One Book One Marin 2009 occured last thursday night, as Dave Eggers and Valentino Achak Deng sat in the Dominican University auditorium before a packed audience and shared slides (a few of his wife and baby son) and thoughts about Valentino’s life and his hometown of Marial Bai. The evening was moving, fascinating, and funny. Valentino had flown in two nights before to attend the Teen Forum (held on Wednesday) and of course, there was a moment where death seemed to grab Valentino by the shoulders and stare at him in the face before slowly walking off into the stormy clouds in search of another companion. Valentino’s flight was delayed, and then struck by lightning. The stewardesses stopped serving snacks and the lights went out for a terrifying bit, and then everything calmed and the plane continued on to its destination. As Valentino, his tall frame folded in a chair across from Dave Eggers on the stage, recounted this event, he also foudn the humor in it: a girl sitting next to him was reading What is the What and demanded to see a passport before believing that it was really him. Valentino noted, “I had to check in twice; once at the airport and once on the plane.”

The informal banter/discussion between Dave and Valentino was playful, respectful and exceedingly comfortable, making it obvious just how well the two got along. Dave admitted to having something close to a breakdown while attempting to write the book as non-fiction; feeling that he couldn’t keep his voice out of Valentino’s story. Eventually, he asked Valentino if they could make it a fictional account where they could embellish certain details and gaps in the story. Valentino recalled thinking, “I thought that’s what he [Dave] was doing in the first place”. Several questions from the audience went to one of the major questions about the book: how much was, in fact, fiction and how much was truth. Dave and Valentino shared a smile and gently avoided giving away too much, but noting that what Valentino went through was real. Yes, the break-in that occurs at the beginning of the book actually happened. They did reveal that William K was alive and building a clinic in southern Sudan, though they had used his name in the novel to describe the way another boy had, in fact, died.

Dave Eggers described the work that Valentino is doing in his hometown since Valentino is “far too modest”. The admiration and respect that Dave has for Valentino and the work that he’s doing was palpable.  In one year, Dave explained, Valentino, hiring a small crew of local men from his hometown, was able to construct a huge brick secondary school. Often driving through muddy roads where cars would get stuck and they would then resort to donkey-pulled carriages, and carrying many of the tools on their own backs, Valentino and his team have built the only secondary school in the area. Valentino wants to create a boarding school for girls in order to help them avoid the pressures of being married off in their adolescence and hopes to see the total enrollment of female students at the school reach 60%.

Valentino’s hope and strength during his project seems only to have grown over the past few years.  When asked what he thought about the underlying tensions behind the tentative peace treaty and what it would be like if the school were to be destroyed should war break out, Valentino responded by saying “the peace will hold”. He pointed out  that giving local people the means to change their situation, to become involved, to give them money or jobs or hope, shows them what is possible during peace, and after seeing that possibility, he believes most people will choose peace over war.

Throughout the whole thing, Valentino remained impeccably modest. One of the most painful yet illuminating parts of the night came when Valentino spoke of returning to Marial Bai after having been gone for 17 years. He said, “it was like a bad dream”, explaining that everyone (his family and friends) who greeted him at the airport looked older and more tired–that he realized he was lucky because he had run from the war while others in his village had stayed and faced day after day with severed limbs, death, starvation, and violence.

At the end of the night, the remarkable and thoughtful Valentino thanked the audience and said that they would be forever in his heart. It was a wonderful glimpse of insight into the extraordinarily good, observant, strong,  intelligent, and determined Valentino Achak Deng.

See his website for more information and to view slides of his impressive undertaking at : http://www.valentinoachakdeng.org/

THANK YOU FOR READING WITH US, MARIN!

~AB

Endings

Oh Valentino, after having read this book, of course we cannot pretend that you do not exist. Your strength is astonishing–there’s one traumatic event after another and yet you refuse to let it silence you. In telling your story, you give voice to what many do not want to hear. I was surprised at the number of people who would hear about your book and say, “oh no- i don’t want to read anything depressing like that. I have enough sadness in my life.” Of course, they have the right to read or not read whatever they want. But you didn’t want to live through all of this, and yet you did. Maybe no one owes you a reading of your book, but it seems to me to be potentially dangerous to silence someone’s story. Throughout your book, you speak to people who do not stop to listen to you, who do not want to listen to you, or who insist you edit your life to make it happier for their needs. It’s selfish, especially considering what you’ve gone through and all that you’re asking is a chance to be heard. It seems to me that there is so much value in being able to tell someone your story, and particularly a difficult one at that. I’ve heard that war veterans who learn how to talk about their experiences often deal better with their post-traumatic stress than soldiers who keep to themselves. The need to not necessarily alert other people (although this is a part of what your story does) but to share your experiences, to communicate with another being in this world, to rework experiences that you may not ever want to relive; that’s a powerful notion. It connects you to the larger world; forms a bond between you and other sentient beings. It’s a right I think you and others deserve, and every time we refuse to listen to you, it’s a negation not only of your life, but also of your importance in the world. Our unwillingness to listen is like a denial of all that you’ve experienced. We are not so different from one another yet there’s a lot of comfort sometimes in emphasizing the differences, because the truth is, who wants to experience what you have? I do not fault anyone for not wanting to hear about it, but it is an injustice to attempt to censor it and to prejudge it. They do not know your story, Valentino, just as I did not know your story when I first picked up your book.  We’ve been taught in school not to make judgments before gathering facts, yet we do it every day as a form of protection. Survival seems to involve filtering out what you need to hear, what you want to hear, and what you don’t want. But in comparison between what you needed protection from and what I need protection from in our everyday lives, how can I possibly be justified in trying to shelter myself? Your book is an experience for all who read it; one that should be passed from hand to hand.  I cannot imagine how important this book was to you, but I do know that it was important for me. Perhaps that’s all I can tell you.

In hearing your story, I find myself counting my blessings. I find myself amazed at the human spirit; at what it can take and overcome. I find myself wondering, if I had been born in your place, what would I have done? What would my life have been like? Would I have survived? What would I do had I lived long enough to make it out of Kakuma and into the U.S.?

I’m proud of One Book One Marin for choosing a book with substance, meaning and message. Though every type of literature is valuable in its own way, this is an important book  not only in message but in style, feeling and structure.  It was highly worthwhile to view the world through another a pair of eyes different from any I have known before. Anything to shake us out of our comfortable zone from time to time is a valuable thing.

Your ending is hopeful, Valentino. It’s a strong ending; one built on confidence and though you do not tell us to take something away from it, your ending acknowledges perhaps the one thing that no one can help but to take away from your story: once we know it, we can never forget it.

~AB

“Things Are Being Lost”

What is it that changes a man? What makes someone who has seen civil war, violence beyond belief, suddenly snap and decide, once they’re living in a “safer” place such as America, that they just can’t take it? Is there anything to the notion that America makes people crazy? Julian says something akin to this once he hears that Valentino was robbed. After Tabitha is killed, “Bobby suggested that Tabitha’s murder was made possible by the madness of this country”(367). Valentino points out that what has never before happened in Sudan, or is very rare, has somehow become much more prevalent, or at the very least, possible, in America. What does it cost someone (culturally, mentally, spiritually, emotionally) who has immigrated to America?

Is there a way in which the civil war among a nation’s people is still in some ways easier to understand than the pressures of emigration and assimilation? Valentino says, “the pressures of life here have changes us. Things are being lost. There is a new desperation, a new kind of theatricality on the part of men.” (367). What is being lost? Is it respect for traditional customs and morals? Is it a strong, overriding grip on reality? Is it sanity? Is it hope? Why this new form of theatricality? What do you think is lost, according to Valentino? What do you think is replacing it? What does it mean for the future of Sudanese men (or all men)? Is America a catalyst for something? If so, what? How?

~AB

Up to Chapter 23–”My God is not a reliable God”

The traumatic exodus from Pinyudo, complete with attacks from the Ethipoians, Eritreans, Anyuak, and alligators, brings Valentino to Pochalla, briefly, and then on to Kakuma.  Moments of brave human empathy break through the heavy darkness of Valentino’s tale. I found myself suprised that it is Achor Achor, not Valentino, who insits that they take Quiet Baby with them on their way to Pochalla.  “We have to take this baby…We don’t need to leave this baby here”, Achor Achor tells Valentino, and in that moment, these two boys, separated from everything they’ve known, tired and starved, demonstrate a compassion which defies all odds. It’s a beautiful reminder of the good side of human nature.

It’s interesting that afterwards, Achor Achor, gives voice to an opinion of disgust, or maybe just disappointment in his people:

“– I get tired of seeing these people, Achor Achor said.

–What people?

–The Dinka, all these people

…

–I don’t always want to be these people, Achor Achor said.

–No, I said, agreeing.

–I really don’t want to be one of these people, he said. –Not forever.” (p.345)

It’s a painful, honest statement.  They do not want to be seen as victims, to stay lumped together as a dying, homeless group of people who were once warriors but who since have been chased from their homes.  Where do you find hope in such a situation? Maybe reflecting on saving Quiet Baby? But then, to look around and see all the other suffering, crying babies, what does one do with that, after a while? It’s not a statement against the people themselves, it’s the voice of anger and despair at the situation that they all commonly share, at the injustice of causing so many lives to seem so insignificantly light that what happens to them matters not at all.

Valentino suffers from a terrible blindness while on the road to Kakuma. If this were pure fiction, I would say something about the symbolism of it beaing unbearable to witness these atrocities; the physical manifestation of the emotional and psychological grief. As it is, it would be a great disservice to attempt to read into Valentino’s actual experience in such a way, and with the poor food and shelter conditions that they have gone through, it’s unfortunately all too understandable that he would experience some physical grief.

In addition to everything else that has gone on in these most recent chapters, we finally understand more about Tabitha. It’s yet another heartbreaking part of Valentino’s tale. That he gets to experience love is wonderful. That it is taken away and that he feels responsible for it are terrible.  She sounded like an interesting person: at times a little moody and manipulative (forgive me, Valentino), yet playful and full of life. To meet such a dramatic and unfair end is shocking and pracitcally unbelievable. However, since we know Valentino’s voice, since we trust him to lead us faithfully through his life, we know that this is not a ploy. Still, how much must one man suffer? We understand now why Valentino was so enraged at TV Boy for rifling through pictures of Tabitha. “God is in my life but I do not depend on him. My God is not a reliable God.” (p.358) What a powerful statement to make. Given what we know of Valentino’s life, I completely understand his statement. I wonder what kind of a relationship one can have with an unreliable God.

~AB

End of Innocence

Well, we’ve arrived with Valentino at the Pinyudo camp in Ehtiopia. The juxtaposition between being treated as an adult and a child is striking. At times, such as when he is playing “hide and seek” with the Royal girls, we are reminded of how young Valentino still is. To come of age in a refugee camp is greatly disconcerting and confusing–developmentally, the boys and girls are all still young; becoming aware of hormones and play wrestling with each other, yet they have also seen more than many adults. I find myself wishing for Valentino to have had more of a childhood; that he and the rest of the children were given as much time as possible to experience what little innocence they have left. As William K lays down by a tree to die, he sounds like an old man. Given what they’ve witnessed and how far they’ve traveled, it is not surprising. It is, however, depressing and horrifying. The distinction of age is blurred here in both life and death–adolescent feelings intertwine with adult responsibilities, and death can claim anyone at any age. No one is safe–the babes, the young, the adults, the old–all die together and just as easily as their neighbor.

(Valentino wonders if God is punishing him, and though we know that he has done nothing to deserve it, what answer is there to give him? We could say that something has been looking out for him since he has managed to survive this long, but there seems to be no end to the suffering and tragic events that he experiences. How, then, is that “looking out for ” him?)

As much as I’d wish it, however, there seems to be little time to stay young. The camp expects the children to behave as young adults; all of the boys are being trained as soldiers and given the tasks of men, such as fetching water or building houses. They are also shown the duplicitous nature of politics when they are made to sing songs for the white U.N. workers who send them food and see an outwardly peaceful and promising camp. As soon as the aid workers are gone, however, Valentino confirms that they never witness the pressures of adult life that are thrust upon the children, nor the fact that much of the food is kept by administrators or sent to soldiers.

Perhaps the most striking passage of the conflict of youth versus adulthood  is when Valentino describes his job as aiding in the burials of other refugees. Here is a boy who has seen life slip away from many his age, who has been separated from his family and walked thousands of miles with practically no food or water, and now he is asked to carry the dead bodies of people in exactly his same situation. There is something so brave and yet heart-breaking when Valentino explains that he refused to bury the infants. We understand his position, but cannot imagine it. It takes a lot of strength to stand up to authority, especially when stating that you will not do a job that they’re asking you to do. Even at his young age, Valentino has set up guidelines for himself that demonstrate a maturity far beyond his years. His refusal to participate in burying infants shows not only his sensitivity but also that he is in touch with a great deal of his feelings and has developed moral guidelines for himself.

~AB

One Book One Marin Final Events!

Our blog isn’t done, but in eager anticipation, we felt we should mention that in celebration of the culmination of 2009 One Book One Marin, there will be  a Teen Forum on April 22nd, 2009 and a celebration event on April 23rd, 2009. Dave Eggers and Valentino Achak Deng will both be present to give their thoughts on the book, and to answer questions. It’s an honor to have such distinguished guests and we hope you’ll be able to make it!

One Book One Marin 2009 Celebration

One Book One Marin 2009 Teen Event

Fiction vs. Truth

“Actually, secretness–which might be called reticence, or discretion, or withholding–is essential to keeping these anomalous works of fiction from tipping over into autobiography or memoir. You can use your life, but only a little, and at an oblique angle…

To edit your life is to save it, for fiction, for yourself. Being identified with your life as others see it may mean that you eventually come to see it that way, too. This can only be a hindrance to memory (and presumably, to invention).”
~Susan Sontag, ‘Where the Stress Falls’.

How does Sontag’s idea of the line between fiction and biography compare with the style that Dave Eggers and Valentino are using in What is the What? Of course, we can only speculate as to how much of his life Valentino has let us see, though to me, it appears that he has opened himself up a great deal, and perhaps, without the “oblique angle” that Sontag refers to. I wonder how Valentino has been personally affected by people claiming to know him through his work–is he impacted in the way that Sontag refers to? Is there any way to create work based on your life and not in some ways, come to see it and yourself as others do? Do you lose something of yourself, as Sontag suggests, if this is the case? Does it depend on who you are? Instances of artists who might have felt susceptible to putting themselves into their art without a “necessary” distance (whatever that may be)  spring to mind–Nirvana’s Kurt Cobain, Basquiat, J.D. Salinger…

To distance yourself from your own story is in many ways, safer. Sontag suggests that in doing so, you afford yourself protection; you can keep your own creativity, but also your own experiences. Are there times in your life when you have experienced, on any level, what Sontag is discussing?

Perhaps truly powerful art, literature that moves and carries with it meaning, must give itself completely to the world it is presented to.  If there is no divide, the finished product is the rawest, most poignant that it can be. If What is the What were written from a more distanced perspective, would it still move us as much?

At the same time, Sontag does present a good point: you cannot share everything in your art; that would almost destroy you, not to mention exhaust you. You’d have to be an extremely resilient, (perhaps egotistical) and secure artist to leave yourself wide open and reveal everything to an audience you do not know.  When Sontag mentions that it may be a hindrance to creativity,  she seems to be saying that in order to get across what you want, to share what you are determined to share yet still keep some of your self private, you need to think creatively, you need to experiment. If you simply put everything on the table (though there is nothing simple about that) and leave nothing to the imagination, you may not pay as much attention to how you express yourself. Your art will suffer. 

What is the What seems to straddle the line beautifully–Valentino does share a great deal, though probably not nearly everything, and Eggers’ decisions of how to tell the story (jumping back and forth between the past and the present) allows both of them to create a powerful, unique, creative and meaningful work of art.

“Tell all the Truth but tell it slant–

Success in Cirrcuit lies

Too bright for our infirm Delight

The Truth’s superb suprise

As Lightening to the Children eased

With explanation kind

The Truth must dazzle gradually

Or every man be blind–
-Emily Dickinson

~AB

Fever to Tell

Achak urgently wants to tell his story to the world, but does anyone want to hear it? Is that why he starts by telling it silently, and why years later, he tells it to Dave Eggers, who tells it to us? He begins by wordlessly telling Powder, Tonya and TV Boy (who later becomes Michael) the story of his life in Sudan, recounting for them in his head the events that led him to Atlanta, the horrors he has survived. Once these people are gone, Achak is still speaking in his head to the people he most wishes would hear him: Edgardo, the nameless Christian neighbors, all of Atlanta, all of America. Achak pounds his feet on the floor, on the door, making as much noise as he possibly can, unable to believe that no one can hear him. But still there is no response, so he concludes that no one wants to hear his wordless appeal. Achak laments, “You have no ears for someone like me,” and then he begins to talk directly to the reader.

It is as though the experience of being robbed and held captive in his own home, induces in Achak an unexpectedly urgent need to make his story known to the great bureaucracy of the Universe. He seems to be saying, “here’s why this shouldn’t be happening again, not here, not to me.” Perhaps there has been some mistake – he has already endured more than his fair allotment of injustice, suffering, and unending things that are too much to bear. If someone could just check the paperwork, they would see that Achak has already done his time, that it is all a clerical error. Things would be set right, and Achak could finally take America up on her promise of refuge and a peaceful life.

As I reach Chapter 13, I find myself thinking, can Achak ever catch a break? Is there any justice or compassion in the great scheme of things for someone who has been through so much? There should be some statute of limitations, some kind of out-of-pocket maximum for suffering, I am thinking, as I sit surrounded by the luxurious trappings of a typical American life. Why do the safety and security I have known all my life seem to elude Ackak for all of his? Would it keep me safe to ignore his frantic thumping on the door of his apartment, to choose not to hear the sounds of someone who needs help, needs a good neighbor, and needs to tell his story? Not really, I conclude. It would only keep me feeling as though I am safe, a feeling I imagine Achak’s neighbors are desperately clinging to as they turn up their TVs a little louder, reluctant to acknowledge how thin the wall is between their reality and Achak’s. What would change if America was willing to really listen to his story?

-AMB

Chapters 10 & 11- A Hodgepdoge of Observations

An interesting note which struck me during these two chapters: the narrative seems to pull together three different story lines. There’s the current story, where Valentino (and I feel strange even calling him “Valentino”, now that we’ve been introduced to him as “Achak”, his actual name) is lying on the floor of his apartment, still captive. Then we have the continued story of his childhood–how his trek to Ethiopia with hundreds of other children begins. Finally, we have the small, as of yet merely danced around topic of a potential love interest, Tabitha. Valentino dropped a hint or two about her earlier, and now we’re beginning to see how much she means to Valentino. How will Eggers balance these three storylines? Will more splinter off in the future?

There’s so much to talk about–the politics of what’s happening to Valentino’s homeland, the cultural differences and similarities between and amongst Dinkas and Baggaras, and the emotions running through Valentino. Valentino is still trapped, at the mercy of a young boy and two American strangers. Once again, he finds himself in peril; forced out of his normal way of life because someone wants something from him and doesn’t seem to care at what cost it comes. Perhaps that’s even harder to take; the fact that it’s not personal. (Or at least, doesn’t seem to be.) The Baggara want the land and the cattle, the humans for farm workers and slaves; Tonya, Michael, and Powder want his goods; the SPLA want to depose the government in Khartoum (as well as the loyalists), and all three of these groups see only their goals, not the devastation that they cause. Who in the book has thought of others? Valentino, of course. Dut, who has become the leader/protector of hundreds of lost boys, Jok and the two women Valentino meets once he flees his village…

I admit that the current state of our narrator bothers me. The parallel between his being a victim in Sudan and his being a victim in America is obvious, and while Valentino also shows us that he is not a victim in his own mind, I feel as though the fact that Eggers and Valentino have chosen to continue with the story while he is still at the mercy of others; that he has been portrayed as not yet being able to stand on his own two feet, is actually  working against him. I want him to rise, to be able to breathe; this trusting man who has seen so much. Why, in his own story, is he still not allowed to stand? I cringe at the thought that the symbolism of his journey from  supinely positioned victim to straight-spined, firm-footed man will carry out until the end: the worn hero rises at last. It seems too formulaic; too Hollywood. I hope this doesn’t turn out to be the case. Perhaps I’m just too cynical.

~AB

What IS the What?

Although we are now through chapter 10, let’s spend a moment on the title of the book. The phrase “what is the what” appears in chapter 6, when Achak’s dad is talking to some local Arabic people. He recounts a story in which the monyjang (African man) are offered a choice from God–they can either choose what they know, or ‘the What’. Hence, the phrase that begs to be asked, “what is the What?” God cannot tell man, he must simply choose. So, the man chooses the cow, what he knows. Achak’s dad recounts “And God has proven that this was the correct decision. God was testing the man. He was testing the man, to see if he could appreciate what he’d been given, if he could take pleasure in the bounty before him, rather than trade it for the unknown.”(62) However, it seems as though perhaps the What is prosperous, in its own way.  The What stands for the unknown, yet it may very well be striving for the What, running towards it, that Achak was able to save his own life. Had Achak gone to investigate the screams of his aunt, or followed his friend, Moses, when raiders attacked their village, he would most likely have been killed. But Achak does not go; some part of him kicks in to survival mode, and he chooses to run, into the great, dark wilderness where nothing is known. He chooses the What, and it helps to save his life.

Yet the What is not without its own dangers. Achak pursues the What as he travels to America, leaving behind all that he knew. Following the What, Achak opens the door to someone he does not know, and winds up bruised, beaten, and bound on the floor of his own apartment.

The title of the novel is an ode to the uncertainty that Valentino Achak Deng has faced throughout his life. So, was the What worth following? Was the cattle really the correct choice in Achak’s father’s story? Does Achak survive in part because he chooses the unknown, and is that what we would call “luck”? Is it “faith”? Is it a survival instinct? What is it that allows Achak to choose what so many others do not?

~AB