Beneath the Lion's Gaze|Maaza Mengiste
In Beneath the Lion’s Gaze, each character contends with a violent dictatorship, with none emerging guiltless or unscathed. Set in Addis Ababa in the mid-seventies, Maaza Mengiste’s debut novel gives a glimpse into the surveillance state perpetuated by Mengistu Haile Mariam’s military regime, which deposed Emperor Haile Selassie and effectively ended Ethiopia’s three-thousand year-old monarchy. As with other actual persons in the novel, the portrayal of both men is fictional, with the character Major Giddu replacing Mengistu as head of the junta, the Derg.
Narrated from the perspective of Hailu—a medical doctor—and his son Dawit, Beneath the Lion’s Gaze opens in the twilight of the emperor’s rule. Famine has once again wracked the countryside, leaving mass starvation and indebted sharecroppers in its wake. Its severity shocks Dawit’s best friend, Mickey, prompting him to detail his observations in a letter to him.
“We eat too much in Addis Ababa. My thick body feels like a scar in this village,” writes the low-ranking soldier with disgust. “We have lived in the city and we have forgotten about these people.”
Mickey, whose impoverished father worked himself to death tilling the soil, goes on to criticise the emperor for neglecting the poor and the feudal system that favours landowners at their expense.
Sensing demonstrations are on the horizon, the emperor tells his prime minister to appease the peasants with handouts. This time, however, bribes don’t yield the desired effect as a growing number of soldiers have joined the fray of Ethiopians disillusioned with their living conditions.
Ultimately, a bloody coup ensues and kicks off the Derg’s reign of the terror, a period that spanned nearly three decades and saw dissidents brutally suppressed, extrajudicial killings, sporadic gun battles between freedom fighters and soldiers, and the nationalisation of private property as part the regime’s communist campaign backed by the Cuban and Russian governments.
In national crises, it’s not uncommon for citizens to turn against one another, which Beneath the Lion’s Gaze poignantly portrays. Friendships are broken, love is fractured, and neighbours become estranged as characters prioritises survival, question their morality and struggle to recognise themselves in a rapidly disintegrating world.
“It’s these times, everyone is changing,” explains Dawit’s sister-in-law after he expresses his disappointment over his girlfriend’s support of the regime’s socialist programs. “The revolution is turning everything upside down.”
Mickey’s friendship with Dawit also sours after he confesses his role in the putsch, and worsens by his continued allegiance to the dictatorship. Dawit’s relationship with his family doesn’t fare any better, having refused to give up his clandestine political activities despite his father and elder brother’s earnest pleas. Meanwhile, Hailu is forced to choose between saving the life of a mutilated prisoner and delivering the coup de grace.
As time goes on, it becomes clear under the military regime that honesty isn’t always the best policy, the truth doesn’t guarantee freedom, and open confrontation means certain death. As such, some resign themselves to the status quo out of fear and apathy.
“Ethiopia had become a country of watchers,” concludes Hailu after his release from prison.
But others like Dawit take up subversion as a weapon against totalitarianism. Resistance then becomes an act of burying the executed, distributing political pamphlets critical of the regime, displaying Ethiopia’s pre-revolution flag in private, and quietly supporting dissidents. These acts of rebellion soon prove insufficient and ineffectual to Dawit, who eventually joins the armed resistance when a neighbour’s young son is imprisoned and tortured to death for inadvertently helping rebels.
Although Ethiopia has the distinction of being the only country in Africa to have escaped colonial rule, it fell victim to the Cold War scramble for Africa. It’s this historical period Beneath the Lion’s Gaze examines, revealing how the country’s experiment with communism resulted in the deaths of tens of thousands of Ethiopian civilians by Russia-supplied guns, while foreign advisers “took up the best nationalised homes” and ruined the economy. In the end, the junta oversaw a mercilessly repressive climate that caused Ethiopians to, once again, fight for the soul of their country.
A version of this review appeared in the 2019 Dec.-Feb. edition of Inzozi, Rwandair’s in-flight magazine.
You May Also Like
