Petit Pays de Gaël Faye
Charactères
Gaby (Gabriel) = Personage principal (Main character)
Ana = Gabys younger sister
Yvonne = Gabys mother (Tutsi, fled Rwanda in 1963 as a child during
ethnic violence to seek refuge in Burundi)
Michel = Gabys father
Gino = Gabys friend (has a Belgian academic father and a dead mother)
Armand = Gaby’s friend (father is a diplomat, class clown)
Francis = Gabys friend (initially an enemy of the boys an orphan who lives
with his uncle)
Eusébie (tante) = Yvonne’s aunt
Pacifique = Yvonne’s older brother (engaged to Jeanne, is killed at the end
for avenging his family's killers)
Jeanne = Pacifique’s fiancé
Rosalie = Yvonne’s grandmother
Mamie = Yvonne’s mother, Gaby’s grandmother (hence the name mamie)
Alphonse = Yvonne’s older brother (killed fighting in the civil war in
Rwanda)
Donatien = Michel’s (dad) right-hand man
Prothé = the chef (a Hutu who is killed by a Tutsi gang in the end)
Innocent = a ‘fixer’, someone who does the dodgy dealings (boss of the
gang at the end)
Calixte = steals things from Michel (dad)
Jaques = friend of Michel (dad)
Historical Background
The novel is set just before and during the Rwandan genocide of
1994 (genocide rwandais de 1994)
Explores the Hutu Tutsi conflict, with Gaby being mixed heritage
(French father, Rwandan mother) it adds complexity to his identity
in a society divided by ethnicity.
The post-colonial influence of Belgian and French colonialism has a
significant impact on shaping national identities and divisions.
Language, education and class distinctions reflect a post-colonial
hierarchy. (The story is set in 1992 & 1993)
Novel being told from the perspective of a child, Gaby, whose
innocent view contrasts with the growing political instability. His
coming of age parallels the collapse of peace in his country.
Cultural context
Rwandan genocide of 1994 (7th April to 19th July):
- Occurred during the Rwandan civil war.
- Over 100 days, 800,000 people were slaughtered
- Members of the Tutsi ethnic group were systematically killed by
Hutu militias in Rwanda
- About 85% of Rwandans are Tutsi
,- A group of Tutsi exiles formed a rebel group, the RPF (Rwandan
Patriotic Front), which invaded Rwanda in 1990 and continued
fighting until a 1993 peace treaty was agreed.
- 6/4/1994, a plane carrying then-President Juvenal Habyarimana and
his counterpart, Cyprien Ntaryamira of Burundi (both Hutus) was
shot down, killing everyone on board.
- Hutu extremists blamed the RPF and immediately started a well-
organised campaign of slaughter. The RPF said the plane had been
shot down by the Hutus to provide an excuse for the genocide.
- Neighbours killed neighbours, and Tutsi women were taken away
and kept as sex slaves.
- At the time, ID cards had people’s ethnic group on them, so militias
set up roadblocks where Tutsis were slaughtered, often with
machetes that were kept in the houses of many Rwandan
households.
- Rwanda’s governing party, MRND, had a youth wing called the
Interahamwe, which was turned into a militia to carry out the
slaughter. Weapons and hit lists were handed out to local groups
who knew where to find the targets. Hutu extremists set up a radio
station, RTLM, and newspapers circulated hate propaganda, urging
people to “weed out the cockroaches” (kill Tutsis) with the names of
prominent people to be killed being read out on the radio. Even
priests and nuns have been convicted of killing people, including
some who sought shelter in churches.
- The UN and Belgium had forces in Rwanda, but the UN mission was
not given a mandate to stop the killing
- The French, allies of the Hutu government, sent a special force to
evacuate their citizens and later set up a supposedly safe zone, but
were accused of not doing enough to stop the slaughter in that area.
- Paul Kagame, Rwanda’s current president, has accused France of
backing those who carried out the massacres, a charge denied by
Paris.
- It ended with the well-organised RPF, backed by Uganda’s army,
gradually seizing more territory until 4/7/1994 when its forces
marched into the capital, Kigali. Around 2 million Hutus, both
civilians and some of those involved in the genocide, then fled
across the border to Zaire (now called the Democratic Republic of
Congo), fearing revenge attacks. Others went to neighbouring
Tanzania and Burundi.
- Human rights groups say RPF fighters killed thousands of Hutu
civilians as they took power and more after they went into Zaire/DR
Congo to pursue the Interahamwe. The RPF denies this,
- While in DR Congo/Zaire, thousands died from cholera, while aid
groups were accused of letting much of their assistance go to aid
the Hutu militias.
- The RPF, now in power in Rwanda, embraced militias fighting both
the Hutu militias and the Congolese army, which was aligned with
the Hutus. The Rwanda-backed rebel groups eventually marched on
, DR Congo’s capital, Kinshasa, and overthrew the government of
Mobutu Sese Seko, installing Laurent Kabila as president
- But the new president’s reluctance to tackle the Hutu militias led to
a new war that involved 6 countries and led to the creation of
numerous armed groups fighting for control over the country. An
estimated five million people died as a result of the conflict, which
lasted until 2003, with some armed groups active until now in the
areas near Rwanda’s border.
- The International Criminal Court was set up in 2002, long after the
Rwandan genocide, so those responsible could not be put on trial.
Instead, the UN Security Council established the International
Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda in the Tanzanian town of Arusha to
prosecute the ringleaders. A total of 93 people were indicted after
lengthy and expensive trials, and dozens of senior officials in the
former regime were convicted of genocide, all of them Hutus. Within
Rwanda, community courts, known as gacaca, were created to
speed up the prosecution of hundreds of thousands of genocide
suspects awaiting trial. Correspondents say up to 10,000 people
died in prison before they could be brought to justice.
- For a decade until 2012, 12,000 gacaca courts met once a week in
villages across the country, often outdoors in a marketplace or
under a tree, trying more than 1.2 million cases.
- Their aim was to achieve truth, justice and reconciliation among
Rwandans as "gacaca" means to sit down and discuss an issue.
Charactères
Gaby (Gabriel) = Personage principal (Main character)
Ana = Gabys younger sister
Yvonne = Gabys mother (Tutsi, fled Rwanda in 1963 as a child during
ethnic violence to seek refuge in Burundi)
Michel = Gabys father
Gino = Gabys friend (has a Belgian academic father and a dead mother)
Armand = Gaby’s friend (father is a diplomat, class clown)
Francis = Gabys friend (initially an enemy of the boys an orphan who lives
with his uncle)
Eusébie (tante) = Yvonne’s aunt
Pacifique = Yvonne’s older brother (engaged to Jeanne, is killed at the end
for avenging his family's killers)
Jeanne = Pacifique’s fiancé
Rosalie = Yvonne’s grandmother
Mamie = Yvonne’s mother, Gaby’s grandmother (hence the name mamie)
Alphonse = Yvonne’s older brother (killed fighting in the civil war in
Rwanda)
Donatien = Michel’s (dad) right-hand man
Prothé = the chef (a Hutu who is killed by a Tutsi gang in the end)
Innocent = a ‘fixer’, someone who does the dodgy dealings (boss of the
gang at the end)
Calixte = steals things from Michel (dad)
Jaques = friend of Michel (dad)
Historical Background
The novel is set just before and during the Rwandan genocide of
1994 (genocide rwandais de 1994)
Explores the Hutu Tutsi conflict, with Gaby being mixed heritage
(French father, Rwandan mother) it adds complexity to his identity
in a society divided by ethnicity.
The post-colonial influence of Belgian and French colonialism has a
significant impact on shaping national identities and divisions.
Language, education and class distinctions reflect a post-colonial
hierarchy. (The story is set in 1992 & 1993)
Novel being told from the perspective of a child, Gaby, whose
innocent view contrasts with the growing political instability. His
coming of age parallels the collapse of peace in his country.
Cultural context
Rwandan genocide of 1994 (7th April to 19th July):
- Occurred during the Rwandan civil war.
- Over 100 days, 800,000 people were slaughtered
- Members of the Tutsi ethnic group were systematically killed by
Hutu militias in Rwanda
- About 85% of Rwandans are Tutsi
,- A group of Tutsi exiles formed a rebel group, the RPF (Rwandan
Patriotic Front), which invaded Rwanda in 1990 and continued
fighting until a 1993 peace treaty was agreed.
- 6/4/1994, a plane carrying then-President Juvenal Habyarimana and
his counterpart, Cyprien Ntaryamira of Burundi (both Hutus) was
shot down, killing everyone on board.
- Hutu extremists blamed the RPF and immediately started a well-
organised campaign of slaughter. The RPF said the plane had been
shot down by the Hutus to provide an excuse for the genocide.
- Neighbours killed neighbours, and Tutsi women were taken away
and kept as sex slaves.
- At the time, ID cards had people’s ethnic group on them, so militias
set up roadblocks where Tutsis were slaughtered, often with
machetes that were kept in the houses of many Rwandan
households.
- Rwanda’s governing party, MRND, had a youth wing called the
Interahamwe, which was turned into a militia to carry out the
slaughter. Weapons and hit lists were handed out to local groups
who knew where to find the targets. Hutu extremists set up a radio
station, RTLM, and newspapers circulated hate propaganda, urging
people to “weed out the cockroaches” (kill Tutsis) with the names of
prominent people to be killed being read out on the radio. Even
priests and nuns have been convicted of killing people, including
some who sought shelter in churches.
- The UN and Belgium had forces in Rwanda, but the UN mission was
not given a mandate to stop the killing
- The French, allies of the Hutu government, sent a special force to
evacuate their citizens and later set up a supposedly safe zone, but
were accused of not doing enough to stop the slaughter in that area.
- Paul Kagame, Rwanda’s current president, has accused France of
backing those who carried out the massacres, a charge denied by
Paris.
- It ended with the well-organised RPF, backed by Uganda’s army,
gradually seizing more territory until 4/7/1994 when its forces
marched into the capital, Kigali. Around 2 million Hutus, both
civilians and some of those involved in the genocide, then fled
across the border to Zaire (now called the Democratic Republic of
Congo), fearing revenge attacks. Others went to neighbouring
Tanzania and Burundi.
- Human rights groups say RPF fighters killed thousands of Hutu
civilians as they took power and more after they went into Zaire/DR
Congo to pursue the Interahamwe. The RPF denies this,
- While in DR Congo/Zaire, thousands died from cholera, while aid
groups were accused of letting much of their assistance go to aid
the Hutu militias.
- The RPF, now in power in Rwanda, embraced militias fighting both
the Hutu militias and the Congolese army, which was aligned with
the Hutus. The Rwanda-backed rebel groups eventually marched on
, DR Congo’s capital, Kinshasa, and overthrew the government of
Mobutu Sese Seko, installing Laurent Kabila as president
- But the new president’s reluctance to tackle the Hutu militias led to
a new war that involved 6 countries and led to the creation of
numerous armed groups fighting for control over the country. An
estimated five million people died as a result of the conflict, which
lasted until 2003, with some armed groups active until now in the
areas near Rwanda’s border.
- The International Criminal Court was set up in 2002, long after the
Rwandan genocide, so those responsible could not be put on trial.
Instead, the UN Security Council established the International
Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda in the Tanzanian town of Arusha to
prosecute the ringleaders. A total of 93 people were indicted after
lengthy and expensive trials, and dozens of senior officials in the
former regime were convicted of genocide, all of them Hutus. Within
Rwanda, community courts, known as gacaca, were created to
speed up the prosecution of hundreds of thousands of genocide
suspects awaiting trial. Correspondents say up to 10,000 people
died in prison before they could be brought to justice.
- For a decade until 2012, 12,000 gacaca courts met once a week in
villages across the country, often outdoors in a marketplace or
under a tree, trying more than 1.2 million cases.
- Their aim was to achieve truth, justice and reconciliation among
Rwandans as "gacaca" means to sit down and discuss an issue.
