Dark Child

In modern days, adults or children, they are leading very busy life according to their tight schedules. Of course, it's a good to be an excellent person as a result. However, we need to look inside the life of each person. This book, “The dark child” by Camara Laye, is an autobiographical story about one boy who sacred traditions struggling against the encroachment of a modern world. Reading the “The Dark Child”, I sincerely felt what the cleanest and the beautiful mind was like and struggles as well. It’s is like story of one’s fight for oneself. While I was reading this book, it brought me the warmth of the little boy's heart and the background of his life as well. I think this book "The Dark Child" is a diary which you should read whether you are a child or an adult. An autobiographical story, “The Dark Child” was written by Camara Laye when he was homesick during his student years in Paris. He tells the story of his childhood until when he left for France at the nineteen years old. He describes village life in nostalgia and contrasts between his village when the time he was a little child and the city when he goes to school in the capital of Conakry. In this, the book describes like a picture of his traditional life in Africa. For example, he shows a variety of daily life from watching his father working on metalwork and participating in his circumcision ceremony. One of the most moving scenes in the book is in the middle of “The Dark Child”, with Laye's tale of his tribal initiation into manhood by bearing the circumcision ritual during his childhood. He participates in a festival of public and private ceremonies for several days and later a period of physical healing and recovery from the circumcision itself for over one month. He spends his days of recovery lounging on a mat with the other young men, isolated from his family for the most part, allowed only to visit with his mother and father from a distance between the end of the ceremony and the day he is able to walk home comfortably. In this book there is an interesting character who is Camara Laye’s mother who is a traditional West African woman who is strong and wise. In this novel, she plays a role in the relationships between her son, Laye, and her husbands. Laye mentioned in this book that his mother has separated him from her other children and keeps him close by in her hut. The other hand, Laye’s father usually undermines the feelings and authority of Laye's mother.
In “The Dark Child”, author, the Camara Laye, seems not to unwilling to tell his society's secrets. As I mentioned, this book is like a diary of Camara Laye. He seems to want readers to understand the beauty and compassion behind his tribe's secrets, like peoples’ true heart.