Growing up amidst the horrors of civil war in Sudan in the 1980s, Valentino Achak Deng witnessed acts that could stamp out the faith of even the staunchest believers in humanity. Hordes of armed men from the north torched his village and massacred his relatives and neighbors when he was just seven years old. Later, Deng saw hundreds of boys his age die as they walked across the desert to seek shelter in Ethiopia. The army that supposedly was fighting for his freedom — the Sudan People’s Liberation Army — drove many other boys to their deaths. But the book that tells the story of Deng’s brutal and courageous life is as much a commentary on its readers as it is on Deng’s experiences and his native country. What is the What, the creative retelling of Deng’s life by journalist and author Dave Eggers, seems to convey that Deng has been victimized by the citizens of his adopted society in America perhaps even more cruelly than he had been during the bleakest days of the war.

Deng’s story involves a 13-year journey from his ravaged village in southern Sudan to refugee camps in Ethiopia and Kenya until, at long last, he is granted asylum in the United States and flown to Atlanta. What Is the What, a fictionalized version of Deng’s life with Deng as the narrator, focuses on a two-day period in Atlanta, opening with him being assaulted and robbed in his own home. In the book, Deng imagines addressing his attackers when they leave him tied-up and bloodied on the floor, then the God-fearing neighbors oblivious to his calls for help, the cop indifferent to the glaring clues at the crime scene, the emergency room receptionist who makes him wait 14 hours for an MRI, and lastly, the harried clients at the fitness center where he works as a receptionist.

A theme running throughout Deng’s narrative is his recurring doubt as to whether he actually exists to the Americans he encounters. All the characters he meets within the two-day span of the novel behave as though Deng were either not alive or not a human being. “This boy thinks I am not of his species, that I am some other kind of creature, one that can be crushed under the weight of a phone book,” Deng surmises when the child of his attackers drops a phone book on his head to shut him up. When Deng calls his own stolen cell phone after he is freed and the child answers, he expresses defeat that the police never bothered to trace his phone number. “This is the moment, above any other, when I wonder if I actually exist. If one of the parties involved, the police or the criminals, believed that I had worth or a voice, then this phone would have been disposed of. But it seems clear that there has been no acknowledgment of my existence on either side of this crime.”

Deng expresses more outrage here than he does when describing the events of his horrific past. Brutal injustices can be wrought by governments and men during times of war; perhaps they are expected. It is these lesser abuses æ such as being ignored æ that truly offend Deng. “In a furious burst, I kick and kick again, flailing my body like a fish run aground,” Deng says, describing his attempts to free himself after the perpetrators leave him bound and gagged on the floor of his apartment. “Hear me, Christian neighbors!  Hear your brother just above!” He waits. “Nothing again. No one is listening. No one is waiting to hear the kicking of a man above. It is unexpected. You have no ears for someone like me.”

A reader will likely feel frustrated for Deng. How could anyone assault someone who has endured so much? How could the police not intervene? How could the neighbors be deaf to his pleas? But in fact, we too are his neighbors. How many times have we been deaf to the kicking of a man above? How many of us consider ourselves sensitive and empathetic, only to act as if some around us don’t exist?
 
“Does this interest you, Julian?” Deng asks the receptionist who sits ignoring him as he waits hours in an empty emergency room for treatment for his bloodied head. “You seem to be well-informed and of empathetic nature, though your compassion surely has a limit. You hear my story of being attacked in my own home, and you shake my hand and look into my eyes and promise treatment to me, but then I wait. … You wear a uniform and have worked at a hospital for some time; I would accept treatment from you, even if you were unsure. But you sit and think you can do nothing.”

Julian does not hear this, of course; Deng is not speaking aloud. But Deng’s words ring in the minds of the readers. It is us he is addressing, and his acknowledgement of our existence despite our ignorance serves as an accusation. “I will tell stories to people who will listen and to people who don’t want to listen, to people who seek me out and to those who run,” Deng states in the book’s final paragraph. “All the while I will know that you are there. How can I pretend that you do not exist? It would be almost as impossible as you pretending that I do not exist.”

Though Deng’s closing tone is a hopeless one — for of course, we can and do act as if he doesn’t exist — his exhortation is clear. To rekindle belief in humanity, we needn’t put an end to all its wars. We must simply assume the responsibility of hearing those we deafly ignore. 

Jennifer Fishbein