End of Beasts

The last part in Beasts of No Nation was interesting. The group saw many different things happening during the last chapter. We saw a rebellion within the group when Strika killed Commandant and fled with many of his fellow comrades. One of the Strika's followers was Agu. Agu asked himself why he didn't kill Commandant earlier because it seemed so easy. We all thought that this was really surprising. We never expected Commandant to be killed by one of his soldiers. It showed me that even the most powerful people or characters fall. 

When the group of rebellious soldiers left, they had no where to go. Strika went down and started to bleed and become unconscious. Agu freaked out and did not know what to do. When Strika died, Agu said it felt like losing a brother. He had already lost his family due to the war and now he lost someone so close to him. It showed me that during war, so many people lose so many things. Agu had lost all of his belongings, his whole family, and his reason for living. 

At the end of the novel, we see Agu explain his dream. He said that his mother was beside him and he meet a white, American lady named Amy. Agu seemed to be happy once again when he left the soldiers. Overall this book was really good. I enjoyed it and I wanted to keep reading.

Beasts 74-116

This part of the book was the biggest section we had to read. With a big section comes lots of important details. In my paper, I discussed the ill-effects of war and how it effects multiple components in life. The one component that was talked about in the book was nature. Agu talks about a palm tree that gives wine and oil. He says that this is a great palm tree, but the soldiers tear it apart because they need its branches for shelter. The army ruined the tree and destroyed the surrounding land. Not only does war ruin families, individuals and societies, it also ruins nature. 

The group also talked about the lack of food and what some of the soldiers needed to resort to. Commandant talks about how he used to eat humans. Cannibalism was a method used by many of the soldiers in the army. I also saw that Agu was dependent on the army because of what the army could provide for him. They gave him food which was necessary for Agu to function. 

An interesting part came up in the book that shocked me when I first read it. Commandant raped Agu and Strika. I had some serious problems with this. Commandant is a fatherly figure to Agu and for him to do such an act to Agu just astounds me. I also had one important question: what was Commandant's motivation for doing this? This wasn't really answered in the group and the only possible explanation was that Commandant wanted to show that he was in charge. There was an argument in the group when Dylan told me he thought Commandant felt bad for raping Agu. I disagreed and said that there is no way that he does something like that and then feels bad. It wasn't a simple mistake, it was definitely pre-meditated. 

I also saw that Commandant was killing people because he thought they were traitors when in reality they really weren't. This shows that he is paranoid and as the war keeps going on, he will just get more and more irritated. But this moment in the novel reminded me of the movie called The Last King of Scotland. Basically the movie is about a man who replaces a president in Uganda who was overthrown and the whole time during his administration he was worried about a rebellion. He killed thousands of Ugandans to keep himself at ease. 

Beasts (p.52-74) Scribe

The main focus of the discussion today was the impact of war. Dylan, Jack and I all made a list of what happened as a result of the fighting and violence in the village. We all agreed that death, loss of belongings, and loss of family and friends were all represented in this part of the novel. There was obviously death due to the radical combatants storming the villages. Agu's father and his fellow villagers were all killed from the army soldiers. Loss of belongings was a crucial part of war. Agu had to leave everything behind. There was not a choice; either get killed and stay put, or run and try to stay alive. Lastly we talked about the loss of family and friends. Agu lost his mother and sister from their escape, and he lost his friend Dike. At such a young age, Agu has gone through so much and I am very surprised of how well he is handling the situation. 

There was one main debate within the group. The debate was over Agu and if he was a man or not. Now I believe (and still do) that Agu is not a man. I do not know his specific age, but he is definitely too young to be a man. A man has to be physically and mentally capable to handle difficult tasks. Even though Agu is dealing with situation pretty well, I still feel that in order to be a man, you have to lead a group and show that you are brave in front of a group of followers. Jack said that he was because of what he had been through. Losing friends and family, seeing people die in front of his eyes was somewhat convincing, but I stayed with my own opinion; Agu is not a man until he is a proven leader.

The conversation stalled after the mentally draining debate. It was started again when Jack told the group to look at page 72 and read the quotation, "...if you are living men you are already becoming devil like them." We dissected the quotation and agreed that this had happened to Agu in the previous chapters. When the radical fighters found Agu, they were going to kill him, but he decided to join the army and become a soldier. By staying alive, he became the devil or parts of his soul were devil-like. 

One question that was brought up was are the same people that Agu is fighting with the same people that killed the villagers and his dad. The group was not sure, but we came to the conclusion that it was not because we figured that Agu would remember these fighters.

Pages 33-52

In the discussion in class, we came up with a pretty good synopsis and analysis of this part of Beasts of No Nation. In the beginning of the chapter, we could tell that Agu was having difficulty dealing with the mental and physical agony of being a soldier. We all came to an agreement that having a child soldier is unacceptable and should be forbidden. We also saw that the reason why Strika doesn't speak is because his parents were killed by the soldiers. We thought that this could possibly be foreshadowing and might happen to Agu. I brought up an interesting point to the group. At the end of the chapter, the author, Uzodinma Iweala, writes "Strika is pulling down his short and showing that he is man to this woman while I am holding her one leg and another soldier is holding another." This might show that not only did the soldiers loot and kill, but they also raped women and children. We also talked about the ox and the leopard at the end of the chapter. Connor came up with the idea that maybe this shows how the African people fight family each and everyday. I tried to work on listening to others and not taking up all the speaking time. It worked out nicely and I found that Dylan and Emily had really excellent points.

Pages 1-32

Beasts of No Nation is an interesting novel. The first three chapters made me want to read more. When the group talked about it in class, some important points were brought up. On page three, there is a part when Agu says that he somewhat happy that he is going to die. I told the group that it seemed like he was giving up on life. An argument arose when Jack said that Agu was an "idiot". Even though i respected his opinion, I had to argue against that point. When you are a young boy, beaten up by a group of radical fighters and recruited as a soldier, it was inevitable for him to be normal. In the discussion, my greatest strength was the way I challenged my peers' thoughts. I also knew the text really well which helped me get my points across. I need to work on becoming a better facilitator, but I feel that this skill will come as the literature circles continue.