Allah is Not Obliged
SynopsisPlot
ALLAH IS NOT OBLIGED TO BE FAIR ABOUT ALL THE THINGS HE DOES HERE ON EARTH.These are the words of the boy soldier Birahima in the final masterpiece by one of Africa’s most celebrated writers, Ahmadou Kourouma. When ten-year-old Birahima's mother dies, he leaves his native village in the Ivory Coast, accompanied by the sorcerer and cook Yacouba, to search for his aunt Mahan. Crossing the border into Liberia, they are seized by rebels and forced into military service. Birahima is given a Kalashnikov, minimal rations of food, a small supply of dope and a tiny wage. Fighting in a chaotic civil war alongside many other boys, Birahima sees death, torture, dismemberment and madness but somehow manages to retain his own sanity.
Story
About this book
Ahmadou Kourouma's novel follows Birahima, a ten-year-old boy from a village in the Ivory Coast who sets out to find his aunt Mahan after his mother dies. Traveling with Yacouba, a man who works as both a sorcerer and a cook, Birahima crosses into Liberia and is captured by rebel forces. He is handed a Kalashnikov, given drugs and minimal food, and made to fight in a civil war alongside other children. The story is told in Birahima's own voice, mixing four dictionaries into his narration as he tries to explain a world that resists explanation.
Kourouma, one of the most recognized writers from West Africa, uses Birahima's perspective to present the mechanics of child soldiering with plain, close-up detail. The boy witnesses killing, mutilation, and breakdown around him, yet his narration carries dark humor and a stubborn directness that keeps it grounded in his effort to simply make sense of events. The title draws from a phrase Birahima repeats throughout: that God is not obliged to be fair in the things that happen on Earth.
The novel is set against the actual civil conflicts that swept through Liberia and Sierra Leone during the 1990s. Kourouma wrote it in French, and it was among his final works before his death in 2003.
