The Translator: A Tribesman's Memoir of Darfur

Review by Pamela Gates

By Daoud Hari
Random House: 2008
204 pages

Last spring, Random House published "The Translator: A Tribesman's Memoir of Darfur" by Daoud Hari, as told to Dennis Michael Burke and Megan M. McKenna. Hari was on tour in the Midwest in April, speaking about his book, but unfortunately didn't make it to Madison. It would have been marvelous to meet this young man, whose picture on the book cover conveys the gentle kindness borne out in his writing, in spite of the atrocities he has seen and experienced.
Hari introduces his brief autobiography with these words: "I am the translator who has taken journalists into dangerous Darfur. It is my intention now to take you there in this book, if you have the courage to come with me."
It did indeed take courage to come with him; but if Hari could live it, the rest of us can at least read about it. He tells with simple, direct humility horrific stories of his experiences in Darfur, his homeland, and in neighboring Chad, where thousands of refugees from Darfur have fled horribly cruel violence, labeled genocide by the Bush administration and perpetrated by Sudan-government-supported Arab militias called janjaweed.
Darfur, Hari explains to some fellow Zaghawa tribesmen, young boys who have joined the janjaweed and captured him, his driver, and an American journalist, was long ago a great country that extended across both Sudan and Chad. The French, who later controlled Chad, and the British, who later controlled Sudan, drew a line down the middle of Darfur and put half in Chad and half in Sudan. "What business is it of [ours] if the French and the British draw lines on maps?" he asks the boys, trying to appeal to their sense of tribal loyalty and to help them understand that they are being manipulated. 
Hari acknowledges to his readers that "this book is in your hands mostly because I was alive to write it." He expresses gratitude to those who helped him get the book written and published, but the basic statement is very true: It is indeed a miracle that he is alive.
Hari demonstrates the incredible humanity of one who has suffered much. In spite of, perhaps in part because of all he has experienced, he approaches life with gentle wisdom and humor. He has lost his beloved older brother in the massacres, but Ahmed's long, strong arms reach vividly across the barrier between life and death and help Daoud through his trials.
Throughout his book, Hari conveys how important family and community are in his culture. He relates his experiences with an acceptance that seems unfathomable but is clearly wise. Though young in years, he shows the wisdom of an elder as he keeps his wits about him throughout his grueling experiences in Darfur and Chad.
Hari's book is another appeal to the outside world to understand — and hopefully act on that understanding of — the horrors that have their roots at least partially in European colonialism and current global economics. Like Daoud Hari, I invite you to read this incredible book by an incredible young man.