New Book in the Tower Reading Room - Short Review
The Law Library recently purchased a copy of Daoud Hari’s The Translator: A Tribesman’s Memoir of Darfur.
Do you remember the news story about an American reporter, Paul Salopek, accused of espionage and jailed by the Sudanese Government two years ago, while in the Darfur region on assignment for National Geographic? This book is written by the Zaghawa tribesman who was his translator, Daoud Hari.
Although Hari relates the events surrounding his association with Salopek, he does so within the much broader scope of events that informed his own youth and young adult life, his family’s history and current situation, the destruction of his village, the devastation of his people and the region. Through his simple, clear voice he places before you, his “reader friend,” the questions that the genocide in Darfur raises concerning the application of justice within the global community. (You will find a copy of The Universal Declaration of Human Rights at the back of the book).
Some of what Hari writes is extremely difficult to read, much less imagine as reality, because so horrific . At one point, as he speaks to children in his sister’s village, the smallest detail brought his images oddly back home:
“Tell me what happened,” I asked the eldest boy, who was perhaps fourteen and would surely be among the resistance troops in a few days or weeks. He was wearing torn jeans and a shredded UCLA sweatshirt that probably had come through the marketplaces from Algeria to El Fasher, having first been donated years ago in the United States.” (p40)
What follows is the description of a Sudanese government airborne attack: poisoned wells, chemical and shrapnel-laden bombs that kill or wound villagers and destroy the resources those who survive would need.
Hari also speaks of human compassion, even among “enemies,” of the strong and lasting bonds of family and friends, and the hope to return and re-build. Overlooking a vast refugee camp in Chad he writes:
“... the women wore their beautiful colors, which stood out through the sticks: clean and bright reds, oranges, yellows, brilliant blues and greens. ... The bold colors they had put away before the attacks were now waving from their lean bodies with defiance – the flags of resilient life.” (p72/3)
At the end of the book, you will find a brief and useful introduction to the history of the Darfur conflicts, a nine-page Darfur Primer.
For more information and reviews see:
For Field Notes of Paul Salopek see:
http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2008/04/sahel/salopek-field-notes
Lastly, the Fall Newsletter of Amnesty International has an article about Hari and the book.
The Translator: A Tribesman’s Memoir of Darfur. Daoud Hari. As Told to Dennis Michael Burke and Megan M. McKenna. New York: Random House, 2008. Pp. xii, 204. ISBN978-1-4000-6744-2 $23.00