Father Uwem Akpan, S.J., Writer

I learned of Father Uwem Akpan, S.J. from Dogberry's blog entry, and forthwith read about him on the link Dogberry provided to the International Herald Tribune. I then found this article about him and his stories at the Times Online. Intrigued and curious, I used a search engine to look for his stories to read, and decided on this one, "My Parents' Bedroom", over at The New Yorker.

To use the word "grim" is insufficient as a description. As I wrote in the comments section of Dogberry's post, I found myself alternately chilled and heartbroken. This story was so cruel; as cruel as, perhaps even more cruel than, "Mateo Falcone", one story that I revisit often if only to remind myself of one of the earliest kicks a story has ever delivered to my gut. "My Parents' Bedroom" delivered the same. In "Mateo Falcone", there is a savage nobility and brutal code of honor that offers some understanding, a form of redemption, warped as it is. There is no such understanding or redemption in Father Akpan's tale. In Prosper Merimee's short story one senses that there are lines in life that still won't be crossed. Such lines are obliterated completely in Father Akpan's.

It has been several hours since I finished reading, and the story's climax is still fresh in my head. Tales of the Holocaust and the Nanking Massacre are the first that come to mind that can deliver and rival the pain of this story. Father Akpan has been to and knows of darker places than many of us, and it can only remind us that despite all the troubles we are going through, truly terrible as they are, we are still luckier than those he writes about. The story is told from the point of view of a child, and it is when that child's purity collides with the worst of mankind's moral putrescence, that puzzlement mixed with repulsion sets in. We are certainly lucky to have the luxury of contemplating that puzzlement.

The title of Father Akpan's recently published collection of stories, "Say You're One Of Them", was taken from what the mother in "My Parents' Bedroom" tells her daughter, a command to save her life. As I read through the articles, I note that many of the descriptions of the stories mimic the most impoverished situations in this country. We don't have to go far to find the same kind of trouble that Father Akpan narrates.

It is easy to be swept away by the sorrow, so I'll try my best to dwell on the positives: here is a man who, despite what he has seen, been through, and writes about, can still carry himself with dignity, strength, and--based on the anecdotes in the articles--humour; here is a man who is brave enough to tell such tales to the world despite the danger it must mean to himself; here is a man who has told a tale that reaches a reader's humanity, as all good stories should on some level; and on a personal note, this story tells me I am not yet that old, jaded, or cynical, as to be unfeeling and devoid of empathy. Would that I never become that way.

(Here is another online story by Father Akpan: An Ex-Mas Feast)