In the Shadow of War

“In the Shadow of War,” a fictional short story by Nigerian author Ben Okri, was first published in the London magazine West Africa in 1983. Five years later, Okri included a revised version in his collection Stars of the New Curfew, which has been out of print since 2004. This anthology marked a point in Okri’s career during which he began to incorporate more magical and fantastical elements into his otherwise realist writing. Okri was a young child living in Nigeria during the time of the country’s civil war--an experience that influenced the subjects of his work and is paralleled in this story of a young boy witnessing the horrors of the war. As many of Okri’s other works do, this story blurs the edges of reality, making it difficult to distinguish what is imagined or real. Okri has received numerous prestigious awards throughout his career including a fellowship to the Royal Society of Literature (1997) and the Order of the British Empire (2001).

In an unnamed Nigerian village, a young boy named Omovo and his father listen to the news of war on the old radio in their home. From the window, Omovo observes three soldiers arrive and settle in at the nearby bar.