Meshach Ajang Alaak: The Father of the Lost Boys – A Memoir by Yuot Ajang Alaak
By Kur Wel Kur, Sydney, Australia
Sunday, July 19, 2020 (PW) — As stated on the cover, its tittle: The Father of the Lost Boys is a memoir whose lead characters(4 characters) are members of a family. The main character, or the hero, Ajang(Meshach) Alaak Yuot is the father of the writer—Yuot Ajang Alaak. The rest of the characters are Abeny {(Preskilla), mother to the writer, and a wife to the main character}, Athok Ajang Alaak(sister to the writer), and Bul A. Yuot, an elder brother to the writer.
The supporting characters are the Lost Boys, formerly and famously known as the Lost Boys of Sudan, but now could legally be called as the Lost Boys of South Sudan, 55th country in Africa, 193rd country in the world.
Having read some of the books from other writers, depicting the horrors and sorrows of the Lost Boys, I am happy to pass my opinions, or emotions about this Memoir: The Father of the Lost Boys. On literary point of view, it’s well written with well grounded imageries.
One of them is below: “We resemble an amateur choir led by a drunken conductor but the spirit of the moment almost, drives me into a trance”.(pg. 63). This sentence is a great example of many other sentences in the book that evoke images in readers’ minds. It nurses the entertaining appetite of imagining a laughable scene.
Not only has the writer entertained the readers by using literary devices, but he has also shaped the global outlook of our former liberators , by shading lights on the common humanity they possessed, and an ability of all humans to reason, something the harsh life of the guerrilla, most of times, peels off.
When they encountered a pride of 8 lions, some soldiers entertained an opinion of killing the lions, but the commander happened to be a conservationist. He spared the pride. So, the writer had this to say: “Despite being a hardened fighter, the commander is also a conservationist.”(pg.38).
As I read on, and experienced the loneliness of the writer, as he missed his dearest father, he recruited me to empathise with him. I held one end as he held the other end of his swinging mood of childhood forgetfulness and fitful mood of missing someone fundamental, his father.
When a writer touches your soul—reader’s soul to feel his/her feelings of excitements or sorrows, then s/he has accomplished her/his duty. Yuot has done this throughout the book. My moment of this feeling came when the family heard Ajang-dit’s voice over the SPLM/A radio from Addis Ababa .
As the voice floated in a radio airwave, his sister —Athok ran to the hand-made football field to inform the boys ( writer and Bul). The excitement bubble bursted open. it was euphoric, almost heavenly happiness. I felt a tingle in my heart because their—children’s (Yuot’s, Bul’s and Athok’s) excitements were projected on me(by the writer), and the book felt like a religious book in my hand.
Describing the freedom fighters—SPLA soldiers, the writer packed the truth of life and death in his childhood memory of how immortal the liberation fighters appeared. He articulated, “[t]hey look larger than life in their darkish-green military fatigues and stand shining with confidence” (pg.64).
Being a survivor of the whole ordeal, the thick and thin of liberation struggle, the writer gave the reader a glimpse of how freedom fighters were brimming with life, a life he witnessed squeezed out of them in the twenty-one years of war. This truth makes the above sentence jumps off the page to your(reader’s) face the moment you start reading it.
One of the themes in the book, is the theme of identity. Some readers might miss it, some might consider this theme as a minor theme, but some would understand from the start that Yuot is proud of his identity, of being ‘muony ’ (man) Kongor (his beloved clan) of Twic East. He portrayed this in many instances.
As I raced toward the end of the book—the finishing line, the writer heightened my desire to truly stay a Dinka, an African, or rhetorically asking himself how to stop being any of them ( Dinka, African or a Lost Boy) of which the opposite is true—he’s proud of them all.
When he talked of his beloved maternal grandmother—Anyieth, he rhetorically posed the following questions: “How do I stop being a Dinka? How do I stop being African? And how I do stop being a Lost Boy, even now that I have been found?”(pg. 208).
This is a nice way, or an enchanting way of closing the book. In other words, he urged us, the Lost Boys, Dinka people, the Africans to dream big, to dream as Dinka people, as Africans, and to keep our ( the Lost Boys’) dreams of changing ourselves and ancestral country for the better.
For me, in rating it, I rate, and recommend it highly. PLEASE CHECK THIS BOOK OUT, you won’t regret your time, or its price. Thanks in advance.
About Post Author
Wow, thanks Kur Wel Kur for the incredible review. How appetising, alluring to the reading of the book: ‘Father of the Lost Boys: A Memoir’! Will surely get hold of it in the near future. I am one of those who wish to learn the story behind the eye-catching, provocative designation of my brothers and sisters ‘LOST BOYS/GIRLS.’
Thanks, Kucdit; and don’t worry about getting it yourself. I will order one for you when this stupid virus leaves us—humans—alone. I will get your address, or if someone is traveling to Nairobi soon, I can just connect you with him/her in order to collect your copy(brand new).
Thanks for your comments.