Genre
It is a fiction.
Setting and Context
A civil war in an unnamed African country.
Narrator and Point of View
The narrator is Agu who holds the view that the civil war was bloody and disastrous.
Tone and Mood
The novel has a melancholy mood while the tone is resigned.
Protagonist and Antagonist
The protagonists are Agu, Strika and other child soldiers whereas the antagonist is the Commander.
Major Conflict
The civil war that was going on in the unnamed African country.
Climax
The child soldiers turned on the commander and killed him.
Foreshadowing
Agu's father had previously told him that everything would be okay when the war was beginning and Agu was later rescued and put in a home.
Understatement
N/A
Allusions
Biblical allusion of the war of David and Goliath. Agu alludes to this biblical event while thinking about the present civil war.
Imagery
Agu describes the commander as, ‘Commandant is kneeling next to me and smiling so I am seeing how his teeths is in his mouth anyhow, just yellow with gap here and there. His gum is black and his eye is so red. His nose is coming out into a very round bulb at the tip which is sticking over his fat brown lip. He is stretching his glove to my face’.
He has built the imagery in the description by using adjectives to describe the commander’s features such as,’ his gum is black’.
Paradox
N/A
Parallelism
The narrator developed a parallel between the old life before the war which was a happy and peaceful life with the life during the war where people were poor and had nothing to eat. The armies were killing civilians mercilessly.
Metonymy and Synecdoche
N/A
Personification
Agu personified sound when he said, 'The sound is fighting the wall.'
