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The Tears of a Man Flow Inward: Growing Up in the Civil War in Burundi
A prizewinning young author tells the moving story of growing up during Burundi's ethnic civil war in this powerful memoir hailed as "a jewel of a book" (Margaret MacMillan).
"There's nothing like a great love song, and Pacifique Irankunda sings a beautiful one here to his homeland and to all those who choose love even in the bleakest of times."-Imbolo Mbue, author of Behold the Dreamers and How Beautiful We Were
Pacifique Irankunda's childhood in Burundi was marked by a thirteen-year civil war-a grueling struggle that destroyed his home, upended his family, and devastated his country's beautiful culture. As young boys, Paci and his brother slept in the woods on nights when the shooting and violence grew too intense; they hid in tall grass and watched as military units rolled in and leveled their village. Paci's extraordinary mother, one of the many inspiring beacons of light in this book, led her children-and others in the village-in ingenious acts of resilience through her indomitable kindness and compassion, even toward the soldiers who threatened their lives.
Drawing on his own memories and those of his family, Paci tells a story of survival in a country whose rich traditions were lost to the ravages of colonialism and ethnic strife.
Written in moving, lyrical prose, The Tears of a Man Flow Inward gives us an illuminating window into what it means to come of age in dark times, and an example of how, even in the midst of uncertainty, violence, and despair, light can almost always be found.
"There's nothing like a great love song, and Pacifique Irankunda sings a beautiful one here to his homeland and to all those who choose love even in the bleakest of times."-Imbolo Mbue, author of Behold the Dreamers and How Beautiful We Were
Pacifique Irankunda's childhood in Burundi was marked by a thirteen-year civil war-a grueling struggle that destroyed his home, upended his family, and devastated his country's beautiful culture. As young boys, Paci and his brother slept in the woods on nights when the shooting and violence grew too intense; they hid in tall grass and watched as military units rolled in and leveled their village. Paci's extraordinary mother, one of the many inspiring beacons of light in this book, led her children-and others in the village-in ingenious acts of resilience through her indomitable kindness and compassion, even toward the soldiers who threatened their lives.
Drawing on his own memories and those of his family, Paci tells a story of survival in a country whose rich traditions were lost to the ravages of colonialism and ethnic strife.
Written in moving, lyrical prose, The Tears of a Man Flow Inward gives us an illuminating window into what it means to come of age in dark times, and an example of how, even in the midst of uncertainty, violence, and despair, light can almost always be found.
Editorial Reviews
"This short memoir, of a boy's life in a far-off and magical but harshly violent world-and of a young man's struggle to make sense of it-is sometimes shocking, often moving, and always fascinating. Pacifique Irankunda's book is hard to put down and impossible to forget."-Evan Thomas, author of First: Sandra Day O'Connor
"Pacifique Irankunda tells a story of suffering and cruelty that nevertheless has hope and wisdom running through it."-Margaret MacMillan, author of War: How Conflict Shaped Us
"Civil wars bring out the worst in us, for they set neighbors and friends against one another. Yet from a childhood lived in that terrible shadow, Pacifique Irankunda has brought forth a finely wrought memoir and a moving meditation on wisdom and justice." -Adam Hochschild, author of King Leopold's Ghost and To End All Wars
"Pacifique Irankunda has written a lucid and deeply personal history of Burundi's brutal colonization and the thirteen-year civil war of which he is a survivor. But for Burundi and Burundians, Irankunda wants more than survival. Drawing on ancient teachings and traditions and on his mother's extraordinary generosity, his vision for the future is a revelation and a rallying cry we would all, wherever we come from, do well to heed."-Nadia Owusu, author of Aftershocks
"Unsparing, unsentimental, and as sweet as nectar, this account of conflict in Burundi is offered by a witness who was only a few years old when it began. This memoir of exceptional potency includes as many luminous recollections as painful ones, but the steady example of a visionary mother shines most brightly of all. ‘If you have no love,' she told her sons during the long strife, ‘you're nobody.' This taut volume may take only a quiet afternoon or two to read, but it will haunt you, I'll wager, for long years to come."-Paul Farmer, chair of the Department of Global Health and Social Medicine at Harvard Medical School
"Pacifique Irankunda tells a story of suffering and cruelty that nevertheless has hope and wisdom running through it."-Margaret MacMillan, author of War: How Conflict Shaped Us
"Civil wars bring out the worst in us, for they set neighbors and friends against one another. Yet from a childhood lived in that terrible shadow, Pacifique Irankunda has brought forth a finely wrought memoir and a moving meditation on wisdom and justice." -Adam Hochschild, author of King Leopold's Ghost and To End All Wars
"Pacifique Irankunda has written a lucid and deeply personal history of Burundi's brutal colonization and the thirteen-year civil war of which he is a survivor. But for Burundi and Burundians, Irankunda wants more than survival. Drawing on ancient teachings and traditions and on his mother's extraordinary generosity, his vision for the future is a revelation and a rallying cry we would all, wherever we come from, do well to heed."-Nadia Owusu, author of Aftershocks
"Unsparing, unsentimental, and as sweet as nectar, this account of conflict in Burundi is offered by a witness who was only a few years old when it began. This memoir of exceptional potency includes as many luminous recollections as painful ones, but the steady example of a visionary mother shines most brightly of all. ‘If you have no love,' she told her sons during the long strife, ‘you're nobody.' This taut volume may take only a quiet afternoon or two to read, but it will haunt you, I'll wager, for long years to come."-Paul Farmer, chair of the Department of Global Health and Social Medicine at Harvard Medical School
Short Excerpt Teaser
PROLOGUE
I find it hard to look back to Burundi, because I have always tried to look ahead. Always. Even as I think these words, looking out my window in Brooklyn, I realize I am nevertheless looking back. I live in a spacious apartment, with six windows facing the water of New York Harbor. It is on the top oor of an apartment building so large it occupies the entire block between Shore Road and Narrows Avenue, next to the Verrazano Bridge. Below Shore Road lies the Belt Parkway. And below the Belt lies the Shore Promenade, and then the harbor, and across the harbor, Staten Island. I like to sit by my living room window, six feet wide, and gaze at the view. I gaze at it every day of the year, and not once have I tired of it.
When I lower my eyes, I look at a rose garden and water fountains and trees, and when I lift my eyes, I watch cruise and cargo ships pass by. These ships are enormous, and they come from all over the world-from Europe, Asia, Africa, Australia, and the Caribbean-bringing people and merchandise to New York. Local ferries and small boats and yachts go by faster than the great ships, which move slowly toward the harbor and slowly seaward toward the Narrows. Every cruise ship that passes grabs my attention. When there are no boats or ships out there, I nd myself gazing long and longingly at a distant view. Instead of New York Harbor I see a view from the hilltop in Kigutu, my native village in Burundi.
I look out over Lake Tanganyika-the world's longest lake and second deepest-toward the peninsula of Ubwari, in the dark mountains of eastern Congo. I stare at the distant view and begin to journey back in thought. Then a cruise ship passes in front of me, grabs my attention, brings me back to Brooklyn, and makes me realize, as if awakened from a dream, that I was looking back. And I hear a voice stored somewhere in my mind, telling me not to look back.
It is the voice of my brother Honoré, telling me, as if I'd never heard it before, the story of Lot's wife, who looked back and turned into a pillar of salt. Hearing Honoré's voice in my mind takes me right back to Burundi, when I returned there during my winter break from Williams College. I still see the image of Honoré, standing in the yellow savanna grass dotted with small eucalyptus. He is telling me not to look back.
Years before, our mother, Maman Clémence, had given me the same advice more gently, saying to always look ahead. However, my older brother drilled "don't look back" into my psyche, so much so that it has disturbed me, causing a mixed effect: neither steadily looking ahead nor daring to fully look back, as if I have become a pillar of salt. Vladimir Nabokov wrote in Speak, Memory that time is a prison, and I sometimes feel as if I am one of its inmates.
I find it hard to look back because most of what I see when I look back is painful. One doctrine of Western psychology has long held that the cure for the pain of memory is a return to the past itself. Burundian cul- ture holds an opposite view. I now realize that each approach has its own wisdom. But for me the past is inescapable.
In the late afternoon, the view from my window in Brooklyn brings me a feeling of peace, which reminds me of looking after cows. I liked to sit at the hilltop and watch the view of Lake Tanganyika while watching my family cows. I would gaze at the water in the lake and then gaze at the cows grazing.
I didn't know then that the cows of Burundi were unusual, because I didn't know that there were other kinds of cows. Ours were tall and long-legged and had enormous horns that could reach a span of ten feet from tip to tip, rising like cathedral arches above their peaceful-looking faces. They were called inyambo, and they were the most ancient of domesticated cattle, descendants of the biblical ox. Historians claim that these cows were present in the Nile Valley some four thousand years before historic times. Drawings of them were found on cave walls and ancient Egyptian monuments. Inyambo were known as the Cattle of Kings, although ordinary people owned them. One of my siblings had named himself Beninka, which means, literally, To Whom the Cows Belong; and my father was named Buhembe, the name of their long horns. Out of those long horns people made trumpets called inzamba. When I am asleep in Brooklyn, I sometimes hear a foghorn from departing cruise ships in New York Harbor; it makes a beautiful sound in the night, sad and distant, and it always makes me think of trumpets, of war, and of ancient times.
Like a person, my country had a name and a surname. If in bureaucratic American English I am "Irankunda, Pacifique," then my country is "Burundi, Milk and Honey." In the past, t...
I find it hard to look back to Burundi, because I have always tried to look ahead. Always. Even as I think these words, looking out my window in Brooklyn, I realize I am nevertheless looking back. I live in a spacious apartment, with six windows facing the water of New York Harbor. It is on the top oor of an apartment building so large it occupies the entire block between Shore Road and Narrows Avenue, next to the Verrazano Bridge. Below Shore Road lies the Belt Parkway. And below the Belt lies the Shore Promenade, and then the harbor, and across the harbor, Staten Island. I like to sit by my living room window, six feet wide, and gaze at the view. I gaze at it every day of the year, and not once have I tired of it.
When I lower my eyes, I look at a rose garden and water fountains and trees, and when I lift my eyes, I watch cruise and cargo ships pass by. These ships are enormous, and they come from all over the world-from Europe, Asia, Africa, Australia, and the Caribbean-bringing people and merchandise to New York. Local ferries and small boats and yachts go by faster than the great ships, which move slowly toward the harbor and slowly seaward toward the Narrows. Every cruise ship that passes grabs my attention. When there are no boats or ships out there, I nd myself gazing long and longingly at a distant view. Instead of New York Harbor I see a view from the hilltop in Kigutu, my native village in Burundi.
I look out over Lake Tanganyika-the world's longest lake and second deepest-toward the peninsula of Ubwari, in the dark mountains of eastern Congo. I stare at the distant view and begin to journey back in thought. Then a cruise ship passes in front of me, grabs my attention, brings me back to Brooklyn, and makes me realize, as if awakened from a dream, that I was looking back. And I hear a voice stored somewhere in my mind, telling me not to look back.
It is the voice of my brother Honoré, telling me, as if I'd never heard it before, the story of Lot's wife, who looked back and turned into a pillar of salt. Hearing Honoré's voice in my mind takes me right back to Burundi, when I returned there during my winter break from Williams College. I still see the image of Honoré, standing in the yellow savanna grass dotted with small eucalyptus. He is telling me not to look back.
Years before, our mother, Maman Clémence, had given me the same advice more gently, saying to always look ahead. However, my older brother drilled "don't look back" into my psyche, so much so that it has disturbed me, causing a mixed effect: neither steadily looking ahead nor daring to fully look back, as if I have become a pillar of salt. Vladimir Nabokov wrote in Speak, Memory that time is a prison, and I sometimes feel as if I am one of its inmates.
I find it hard to look back because most of what I see when I look back is painful. One doctrine of Western psychology has long held that the cure for the pain of memory is a return to the past itself. Burundian cul- ture holds an opposite view. I now realize that each approach has its own wisdom. But for me the past is inescapable.
In the late afternoon, the view from my window in Brooklyn brings me a feeling of peace, which reminds me of looking after cows. I liked to sit at the hilltop and watch the view of Lake Tanganyika while watching my family cows. I would gaze at the water in the lake and then gaze at the cows grazing.
I didn't know then that the cows of Burundi were unusual, because I didn't know that there were other kinds of cows. Ours were tall and long-legged and had enormous horns that could reach a span of ten feet from tip to tip, rising like cathedral arches above their peaceful-looking faces. They were called inyambo, and they were the most ancient of domesticated cattle, descendants of the biblical ox. Historians claim that these cows were present in the Nile Valley some four thousand years before historic times. Drawings of them were found on cave walls and ancient Egyptian monuments. Inyambo were known as the Cattle of Kings, although ordinary people owned them. One of my siblings had named himself Beninka, which means, literally, To Whom the Cows Belong; and my father was named Buhembe, the name of their long horns. Out of those long horns people made trumpets called inzamba. When I am asleep in Brooklyn, I sometimes hear a foghorn from departing cruise ships in New York Harbor; it makes a beautiful sound in the night, sad and distant, and it always makes me think of trumpets, of war, and of ancient times.
Like a person, my country had a name and a surname. If in bureaucratic American English I am "Irankunda, Pacifique," then my country is "Burundi, Milk and Honey." In the past, t...
