I seem to be reading about war and refugees a lot. I'm almost through What Is the What, which continues to heap on more and more varieties of tragedy and atrocity. I've also started Katherine Paterson's new book The Day of the Pelican, another novel about a real-life modern bloody conflict which the US largely ignores. Reading these stories, learning about the government-sponsored massacres and butchering in Sudan and Kosovo, makes me wonder what we're doing in Iraq. This willy-nilly raping, burning, and slaughtering still happens daily in places like the Congo, and we only catch rumors of it. We choose to stay on the sidelines because we don't want to get involved in "tribal disputes" or "regional conflicts," as if the right to kill people in order to grab their land is a sacred piece of one's culture.
The Day of the Pelican reminds me of Number the Stars. Both stories feature young girls living in the build-up to war. Serbian soldiers stand at corners, an unobtrusive but menacing shadow on daily life. The girls coming from home from school temper their natural exuberance so as not to raise suspicion. As if running down the street is illegal, or ten-year-old girls are plotting the revolution. I wonder what happens to a young man, be he German or Serbian, that he looks for an excuse to harass young school girls. How does one build up the hatred or blindness that sees these people as annoying, expendable things? And when do I do that? True, I'm not kicking people out of their homes, but how would I act if I had a large gun and responsibility? Do I see the brotherhood in everybody, or are there people I write off?
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I finished _Day of the Pelican_. It still isn't one of my favorite Katherine Paterson books. It moved a little too quickly, and the writing felt choppy because of the short, declarative sentences. I did appreciate the exploration of bitterness and hate. The story is told from the point of view of Meli, the teenage daughter of the family. She has a brother, Mehmet, who is two years older than her. Paterson tackles a realistic but complex human reaction. Meli and Mehmet are not poor, innocent victims. They start to experience the hatred against the Serbs that the Serbs feel for the Kosovars. Paterson details the effects of this hatred. Meli sees how Mehmet's hatred hardens him and isolates him from his family and friends. Eventually the book has a happy ending, but it's not a clean resolution. Instead it's a point of growing, knowing that problems will continue to appear.
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