4.3: "War and Sexual Violence- An Analysis of Ugwu in Adichie’s Half of a Yellow Sun" By Anna Keller

War and Sexual Violence: An Analysis of Ugwu in Adichie’s Half of a Yellow Sun

By Anna Keller

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie illuminates the crux of humanity in her historical novel Half of a Yellow Sun. She creates certain tensions that exist between characters’ actions and their extraneous circumstances that hinge upon the violence of war. Ugwu is an incredibly complex character whose actions drive the plot forward significantly. He is transformed from an innocent, young boy with typical human desires to somebody who commits sexual violence, and what makes the narrative all the more tragic is that war shapes all his experiences. Ultimately, although Ugwu commits a heinous crime, Adichie compels readers to sympathize with him through graphically illustrating his endearing qualities and firsthand war traumas, all the while eliciting questions about what role masculinity and power play in the perpetration of sexual violence.

Ugwu comes across as an eager and excited character, who aims to please those around him. When he imagines giving Nnesinachi chicken to get her to notice him, the gesture is innocent enough (Adichie 9). Additionally, he continuously calls Odenigbo “sah” even after Odenigbo repeatedly asks him to stop (Adichie 17). However, we see this innocence later devolve into deplorable violence. When he kisses Eberechi, the first woman he has romantic feelings for and fosters an emotional connection with, he still sexualizes and dehumanizes her. He notices Eberechi’s “perfectly rounded buttocks” (Adichie 252). The novel explicitly points out that her buttocks are the very first thing he notices about her. She also pushes his hand away when he reaches for her breast (Adichie 446). Then, further attempting to sexualize their encounter, he hastily “[slips] his hand under her skirt” (Adichie 446). He insists, “Just let me see” (Adichie 447). This behavior dehumanizes her, demonstrating his inability to respect her boundaries, which is a hallmark sign of immaturity. In spite of this scene, Adichie immediately gives readers an emotional whiplash by juxtaposing the sexual aggression of the scene with Ugwu’s raw, emotional vulnerability: “It didn’t matter that she was still seeing the officer. What mattered was the more . . .” (Adichie 447). Eberechi, in spite of the way Ugwu sexualizes her, is the first woman he comes to truly care for. Adichie pulls on our heartstrings even more by making Ugwu get conscripted immediately after his encounter with Eberechi, effectively robbing him of his chance to tell her he loves her (Adichie 447). Even though Ugwu sexualizes Eberechi’s body, he still cares for her. He cannot cognitively combat the sexist ideals that have been drilled into him from a young age. His asking Eberechi to see up her skirt is a manifestation of the sexist principles in the society Adichie constructs.

Ugwu matures emotionally and sexually throughout the course of the novel only to a certain extent. This incomplete maturation is clarified through his involuntary erection at the scene of gang raping the bartender. However, Adichie plays with foreshadowing, tone, and setting very precisely here because she sets the parameters for a possible validation of Ugwu’s sexual assault as a result of the way he is raised to objectify women. He also harbors a certain fear of rejection from his fellow soldiers that contributes to his decision to rape the girl. Ugwu “[suspects] it [will] be important to win High-Tech’s respect, and he [will] succeed only by showing nothing of the fear that [is] crawling all over him” (Adichie 449). It is this fear of not being respected or accepted by his comrades that causes him to participate in the rape. Adichie includes Ugwu’s fear in order to humanize him to a certain degree in spite of the dehumanization he participates in. This juxtaposition illustrates Adichie’s larger thematic revelation in the novel: people placed in challenging situations will make mistakes, and they should still be sympathized with because they are only human.

Some of Ugwu’s actions are a mixture of endearing and revolting, which makes his characterization even more confounding. For instance, he wants to feel his own sister’s breasts so that he can compare them to Nnesinachi’s (Adichie 10). He wonders if “those pointy breasts” would feel “mushy-soft or hard like the unripe fruit from the ube tree” (Adichie 9-10). This statement actualizes his sense of entitlement towards young and attractive women. However, this entitlement comes from a larger scope of sexism: young men are encouraged to participate in the objectification of women. Ugwu’s socialization complicates his perception of women considerably. In the case of Eberechi, he “[sees] a figure with rounded buttocks leaving the compound and he [wants] to call out, Eberechi! . . .” (Adichie 451). The fact that he is reminded of Eberechi is heart-wrenching, but the gesture is still primarily sexually objectifying in nature. It is also endearing that Ugwu wants to prevent himself from making friends with his comrades, because if those friends die it will be harder to grieve (Adichie 453). Building off of this complex characterization, High-Tech calls Ugwu Target Destroyer after his performance at their last battle (Adichie 458). “Target Destroyer” becomes Ugwu’s wartime identity, allowing him to commit atrocities that “regular” Ugwu would not dare dream of.

In contrast to these alarming character qualities, Ugwu also demonstrates humanity and suffers the most directly from the hands of the war, which compels readers to sympathize with his otherwise unforgivable actions. For instance, he acts as a caretaker for Baby, Odenigbo and Olanna’s child. He gives her baths, makes her dinner, and plays with her. This caretaking is one way Ugwu becomes family to Olanna and Odenigbo. Another, more complex and multifaceted example is his repulsion at the idea of his sister Anulika as sexually mature. He “[cannot] bear to think of the man’s ugly body thrusting into his sister’s” (Adichie 151). On the one hand, he may feel protective over his sister, which highlights his human side. But on the other hand, he has internalized that sexual empowerment is a realm that belongs exclusively to men, so he has this compulsion to control Anulika’s sexuality. Due to the sexist nature of the society Adichie creates, Ugwu has learned from a young age that men should be “in charge” in more avenues than one, including sex, which alludes to the sexual violence that takes place later in the novel.

Adichie also alludes to the ambiguity concerning Ugwu’s violence during the war, and asserts that he is in his own way a victim of the war. His humanity is further actualized when Adichie reveals how angry Ugwu feels on Eberechi’s behalf when her parents coerce her to sleep with an army man. Ugwu “would treat her with the respect she [deserves] and do only what she [likes], only what she [wants] him to do” (Adichie 369). This realization is the first explicit proof in the novel that Ugwu likes Eberechi for more than just her body. Additionally, his sadness at the sex positions book not being in their house morphs into a greater sadness at there not being a lot of books in the house in general (Adichie 370). This web of emotions makes Ugwu more sympathetic because he loves books so much that he ends up writing one himself. Ugwu acknowledges that Eberechi is more than just a fantasy to him, for he says Eberechi is “one he [has] come to care for because of what she [says] and [does], and not what he [imagines] she [will] say and do” (Adichie 371). In contrast to Nnesinachi, who is only a fantasy to him, Eberechi is a tangible representation of Ugwu’s matured perception of women. Ugwu “[wells] up with a surge of recognition and [wants] to say, over and over, that he [loves] her” (Adichie 371). Of course, as noted above, this moment never occurs. However, even though it never occurs, the moment is crucial to his emotional growth because he is able to express that he loves a woman even if he cannot show it in all the right ways. In this recognition, Ugwu demonstrates some emotional growth, which makes his sexual violence significantly harder to interpret.

In her construction of the rape scene, Adichie focuses our attention on the inherent masculinity of war. Adichie explores masculinity in this particular historical context, in the way it is manipulated and exploited for certain causes. This masculinity becomes synonymous with particular kinds of violences, such as sexual assault. War is a historically masculine phenomenon. Once the war begins, Ugwu views the fighting as an avenue of power and assertion. He is immediately thrown into a world of cruelty and darkness that will permanently corrupt his soul. Ugwu has fear mixed with excitement about being a soldier, and it is unclear how much of this supposed excitement is due to Odenigbo imposing his Biafran nationalism on him (Adichie 451). Odenigbo may not impose nationalism on Ugwu intentionally, but he is so dedicated to the cause and Ugwu looks up to him so much that the results are inevitable. Ugwu desperately wants to please Odenigbo, and will go to significant lengths to maintain that relationship. Odenigbo is an early masculine presence in his life, which fosters a deep connection. Due to the nature of the way Odenigbo talks about Biafra, Ugwu also thinks a Biafran landmine sounds “glamorous” (Adichie 451). He may even see the weapon as glamorous because he is associating the weapon to his relationship with Odenigbo. Either way, this dichotomy of emotions has tumultuous effects on both Ugwu and his victim.

Adichie alludes to a split in Ugwu’s identity during the war. Although he has sexualized every female figure in his life, even his own sister, his rape of the bartender is still shocking because he is so young and likeable. Ugwu describes his sexual release as “self-loathing,” which complicates the atrocity of the deed considerably (Adichie 458). Adichie describes Ugwu as “[unwrapping] his mind from his body, [separating] the two . . .” (Adichie 458). This separation of mind and body exposes the trauma of war and violence, and Adichie narrates the rape in such a way that suggests that Ugwu must have split his mind from his body while violating the girl. He gives into his bodily urges, but in a separate context the rape is mental because he is reclaiming a supposed, false power. The novel has made it explicitly clear that Ugwu struggles with his identity throughout the war. Ugwu “[touches] his own skin and [thinks] of its decay” (Adichie 458). A part of him dies after he rapes the girl, and he perceives his decaying skin as a physical manifestation of his spiritual death. He has basically dehumanized himself now, and so keeps fighting without really experiencing emotion.

Another way Adichie conveys Ugwu’s likability is through his diminished pride in the Biafran cause. Ugwu has nightmares of raping the girl, except instead of the bartender he sees Eberechi’s face. He wakes up hating himself (Adichie 497). Additionally, Ugwu tearing up his own written work out of insecurity is both endearing and tragic (Adichie 498). All his passion for Biafra gets snuffed out when he faces the reality of the cause. He asks Harrison to turn the radio off when “His Excellency” is about to deliver a speech, and says, “There is no such thing as greatness” (Adichie 500). Ugwu struggles against his despair and self-loathing and tries to cling onto humanity and love. He diminishes his own work when Richard asks him about it, calling the writing a “small thing” (Adichie 508). When Ugwu and the others return to Olanna and Odenigbo’s house after the war, he wants to “clean” and “scrub furiously” (Adichie 523). He “[fears], though, that it [will] change nothing” (Adichie 523). Here Ugwu refers to Odenigbo and Olanna’s house, but he could be referencing his own spirit, his childlike innocence that existed before war and violence swept over the nation like a bird attacking its prey. What Ugwu really wants to clean and scrub is his soul, and he cannot.

Ugwu’s internal conflict is analogous to the lack of unity in both Biafra as a whole and its soldiers. Turning schools into refugee camps, Biafra as a nation cannot provide education much less safety for its citizens. Children starve. The cause they are fighting for becomes moot because they are unable to sustain themselves as a nation. Furthermore, their soldiers are conscripted by force, which fosters disillusionment with the Biafran cause and emotional separation amongst the troops. According to Dara Kay Cohen, “combatant socialization is the explanation for the variation of rape in civil war” (461). What she means is that because the soldiers do not have the natural patriotism necessary for fighting together and social cohesion outside the immediate context of frontline battle, soldiers find alternate methods to bond. She says that gang rape “enables groups with forcibly recruited fighters to create bonds of loyalty and esteem from initial circumstances of fear and mistrust” (461). There is certainly fear and mistrust from Ugwu that Adichie narrates heavily throughout the portion of the novel dedicated to the war. Therein lies a certain tension in the text between the masculinity that Ugwu seeks and the humanity he so desperately attempts to cling onto. In Cohen’s scholarship, she asserts that soldiers participate in rape to “revel in a sense of enhanced masculinity” (464). This participation raises the question of what it really means to be masculine, which Adichie explores in depth in her novel. During the rape scene, High-Tech says, “Target Destroyer, aren’t you a man?” (Adichie 458). Ugwu feels as though his masculinity is being threatened; the definition of “man” is manipulated in heavily toxic ways in contexts of war. High-Tech believes that to be a respectable man is to sexually dominate a woman against her consent. It is concerning how much rape is normalized in violent contexts.

Additionally, there are patterns of masculinity in war contexts that serve solely to degrade women. Maria Eriksson Baaz interviews Congolese soldiers about rape, and the responses show the dangers of objectifying women. One soldier says that “women are like flowers, and she could also satisfy [his] needs. When you have been in battle it is like a desert, and she could help you with that” (506). Soldiers participate in rape for a variety of reasons, but one primary common denominator is the demonstration of a preconceived, false notion of masculinity. One significant aspect of the rape scene is that it occurs immediately after the Biafran soldiers claim a victory. They are raping this girl in celebration. Ugwu has just been named “Target Destroyer,” so his identity has just begun to collapse in on itself. Once this implosion occurs, Ugwu is vulnerable to the pressures that his comrades place on him as well as the larger pressures of a patriarchal Nigerian society. Baaz asserts that their “experiences and performances of masculinities [are] both multiple and incoherent, perpetually evoking a sense of failure at ever arriving at being ‘masculine’” (497). Men in war consistently have a distorted idea about what masculinity represents. Congolese soldiers “explicitly [link] their rationale for rape with their inabilities (or ‘failures’) to inhabit certain idealized notions of heterosexual manhood” (Baaz 497). To soldiers, a lack of sex equals a lack of masculinity. Men’s sexuality serves as “a driving force, which, when unleashed by the climate of warring in which ‘normal’ societal controls are suspended and the rules of warfare reign, easily results in rape” (Baaz 498). One soldier says, “If there is one rotten orange in a bag, it will make all oranges in the sack rot” (Baaz 501). This statement alludes to the gang rape Ugwu participates in because Ugwu experiences the effects of peer pressure from his comrades. Another stipulates that rape is a “problem of the organization of society,” meaning that the number of rapes is directly contingent upon the level of poverty and suffering in that society (Baaz 509). In Biafra, for instance, the country is tarnished with war and violence, and as a result the country suffers from high amounts of poverty. People are additionally being displaced in refugee camps. As a result, Adichie gives us two examples where rape becomes a result of the conditions of Biafra: the bartender, and Ugwu’s sister, Anulika.

Opportunities for sexual violence seem to change within the framework of war. Baaz says that “previously unthinkable behavior becomes conceivable and even dedramatized through the process of dehumanizing and ‘normalization’ of violence and killing” (510). The reasons for the violence, the soldiers say, “lie outside of their ‘normal’ character; instead, violence is induced by drugs and the craziness of war which ‘destroys’ the otherwise healthy ‘minds of the people’” (512). The soldiers’ shifting of the blame from themselves to the circumstances highlights the atrocity and tragedy of wartime rape. They insist that the deed is morally wrong, yet they still senselessly justify rape as a means to satisfy their own sexual hunger and assert masculine power. This inaccurate definition of masculinity has damaging effects on society that Adichie displays in her novel. Patriarchy is normal in this society that Adichie represents. There is already a recipe for sexual disaster, but war exacerbates this problem. Sexism and patriarchy is a larger issue within the scope of Nigerian culture.

Adichie ties in the problem of soldiers’ perceived masculinity with Ugwu’s own personal struggle with masculinity. As it occurs, as soon as High-Tech asks him if he is a “man” he responds accordingly and gets aroused (Adichie 458). Because Ugwu responds to a threat to his masculinity, he rapes the girl not because he is attracted to her but because he has a readily available method to assert his masculinity and power. As a result, Adichie has considerable leverage in her attempt to humanize him at the novel’s conclusion because ideals of masculinity are instilled into men from a very young age, and it can take years of careful, deliberate deconstruction to unlearn those toxic principles. Ugwu adapts fairly well to change, especially considering how much change he acclimates to in a short period of time. At the bar before he rapes the girl, as he soaks in the victory and undoubtedly contemplates whether he truly feels victorious for contributing to the destruction of innocent lives, he says, “Everything [is] moving so fast. He [is] not living his life; life [is] living him” (Adichie 457). His thoughts reflect the uncanny ability for an instrument as powerful as war to inflict major wounds upon the mind. As a result, he feels a loss of control when fighting because he is forced into the activity. His struggle to recover from a loss of control manifests in his assault of the girl.

Ugwu’s rape of the girl in the bar symbolizes a larger distortion of masculinity and power. In Augustine Asaah’s rhetoric, she asserts that whether rape is perpetrated in non-conflict contexts or conditions of armed conflict, “[it] is always a patriarchal issue, for it is grounded in the sexist belief that brute force can be used to elicit sexual favor” (336). In Ugwu’s case, he is afraid of his comrades’ perception of him, specifically that he would be perceived as “weak.” His fear of weakness manifests itself in his act of sexual violence, and it could even be perceived that he feels as though he is growing into himself as he rapes the bartender. Asaah says that leadership in militia, particularly adolescent militia, is “bestowed upon those who have caused the most violence to victims and the vulnerable” (349). Ugwu is growing into a masculine identity that fits the ideals he has been exposed to since he was a boy.

Rape is an issue which has roots that are deeply engrained in masculine control. Jeremy Posadas, in his rhetoric, says that “while rape culture is the mechanism that channels toxic masculinity into specific, socially legitimized practices of sexual violence,” the solution to “[eradicating] sexual violence” is to “[transform] the apparatuses by which boys are subjectified into toxically masculine men” (178). In other words, changing the ideals that are instilled in men at a young age is key to moving our culture away from rape tolerance. Another deterrent is that women feel inferior and diminished by their experience, and are therefore afraid to speak up. According to Katharine Baker, juries often blame the victim (234). Outward victim-blaming leads to an internalization of sexist ideals and frameworks. Additionally, Baker asserts that men have not internalized the atrocity of rape, which results in a continuation of the vicious cycle. Baker says that rapists “understand rape as a means of acquiring social goods” (235). Ugwu wants to socially and emotionally belong to the group of soldiers since at the time, the soldiers are the only community he has. He is also compelled to assert his power and masculinity in ways that reflect the deeply sexist principles of the culture in which he has been socialized.

The novel ultimately reveals that the book within the book, “The World Was Silent When We Died,” is Ugwu’s, which grants him a form of redemption. Adichie rehumanizes him at the end of the novel and provides him with a source of power — writing — that amplifies his endearing personality rather than deteriorates his humanity. Throughout the majority of the novel, Ugwu struggles to feel important or validated. As a young adolescent boy who has all these sexual urges without fully understanding women or gender dynamics, coming of age during war where toxic masculinity is at its peak, it is almost no wonder he participates in such violent activities. However, the novel provides him an alternative avenue at its conclusion by making him a writer. In addition to feeling true sorrow and remorse, he is able to voice his struggles through the power of storytelling rather than the power of toxic masculinity, which is a significant improvement. Masculinity, power, war and rape are all interconnected and create a system of sexism through which we see Ugwu. It is also through this system that we are able to see how Ugwu’s person is negatively affected. Adichie highlights the complexity of human beings in her novel, and conveys through the war’s tragedy that her characters are not defined by their traumas or systems of power. Ugwu is a victim in his own way because he is subject to the same toxic masculinity that he is playing into.

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