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Tuesday, May 16, 2006
Deogratias
This could be the bleakest read all year. That could make this book disposable. Instead Strassen’s story has enough human truths in it that the book is it vital.
It’s a short read but that just makes the book hit harder. The book’s translator, Alexis Siegel, provides a helpful introduction explaining the history of Rwanda and the genocide that occurred in the early 1990’s. It’s good that information is all in the reader’s head as he/she starts the story because the genocide will hang over every panel of this book. Strassen has the book flash-forward and –backward around the genocide, focusing on the eponymous character who is just a young boy. We read what happens before the genocide and what happened afterward but the actual horror is only seen in the end. There’s this great tension, really skin-crawling at times, especially in the flash-forwards.
All the scenes are real brief with Strassen packing just the right amount of information and emotion a scene needs with in a small amount of time. I never felt like it was a “quick read,” though. Perhaps that’s because even though the scenes maybe short they’re all so heavy with sadness and anticipating horror that I just got captivated.
The book’s bleak atmosphere doesn’t come from the story of genocide. The story is concerned with the human soul at its very bleakest. In the flash-backs we see Rwanda at a (relative) calm and read of both natives and missionaries acting like flawed human beings. The stories of indentured servitude and out-of-wedlock children feel extra-disturbing when you realize what is at stake in this troubled country, a wisdom the characters sadly lack. Strassen draws all his characters with wide faces that can convey a lot of information. Deogratias’ madness in the flash-forwards is a particularly compelling image.
Throughout the story I expected the child Deogratias to be an innocent in this story of human barbarism. I won’t ruin the ending for you but I can assure you that my assumptions were incorrect. Strassen could have just written a book with horrific events happening around a heroic human being. Instead he tells a story of where the horrors on the outside only reflect what the horrors these characters hold inside them.
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