In My Home There Is No More Sorrow: Ten Days in Rwanda

by Rick Bass

Last year Rick Bass traveled to Rwanda, roaming from the bustle of Kigali to the breathtaking volcanic preserves of the last few mountain gorillas. Now he offers an extraordinary portrait of what can be found in that country today—heartbreaking evidence of the genocide that occurred there a generation ago, dazzling natural beauty, and young people who have emerged from tragedy with a blazingly optimistic spirit and a profound artistic voice. In My Home There Is No More Sorrow is an enchanting, harrowing narrative achievement—an unforgettable exploration of history and human nature from one of our greatest essayists.

Genres: Nonfiction, Memoir, Travel, Horror

184 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2012

About the author

Rick Bass was born in Fort Worth, Texas, and grew up in Houston, the son of a geologist. He studied petroleum geology at Utah State University and while working as a petroleum geologist in Jackson, Mississippi, began writing short stories on his lunch breaks. In 1987, he moved with his wife, the artist Elizabeth Hughes Bass, to Montana’s remote Yaak Valley and became an active environmentalist, working to protect his adopted home from the destructive encroachment of roads and logging. He serves on the board of both the Yaak Valley Forest Council and Round River Conservation Studies and continues to live with his family on a ranch in Montana, actively engaged in saving the American wilderness.

Bass received the PEN/Nelson Algren Award in 1988 for his first short story, “The Watch,” and won the James Jones Fellowship Award for his novel Where the Sea Used To Be. His novel The Hermit’s Story was a Los Angeles Times Best Book of the Year in 2000. The Lives of Rocks was a finalist for the Story Prize and was chosen as a Best Book of the Year in 2006 by the Rocky Mountain News. Bass’s stories have also been awarded the Pushcart Prize and the O. Henry Award and have been collected in The Best American Short Stories.

Reviews

[Rebecca]

I'm not gonna rate this book.

I think all of the criticisms are right on: the book suffers from the writer's internal po-mo crisis and inability to say anything without immediately taking it back, feeling guilty for it.

But, clearly none of the critics have ever been forced to witness and write about fresh genocide memorials from a personal and outsider perspective. It's an impossible thing to write about in any other way. And, what he is actually trying to capture - the deep, powerful joy that these people radiate in spite of the pain - I think he does a good job communicating.

I have a small experience with this, as an American living in South Africa during Mandela's presidency. I couldn't have put it in words any better than Rick, even as you cringe through the apologies.

The gorillas didn't fit the narrative, but he's writing a travel book, and it was important to him.

And here's to McSweeney's, for publishing the work from the Butare writing workshop as Terry Tempest Williams and Rick Bass promised. They found someone who was willing to listen and to print.

[Charlotte · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book length essay, as it is described, is both hard to read and hard to put down. I read the whole thing in one day and feel strangely uplifted and horrified. I think thats the point.

[Karen · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is basically an extended travel essay, plus an uneasy meditation on the experience of being a white American among black Rwandans, seventeen years after America declined to do any good during the 1994 genocide. Bass was invited to go to Rwanda and co-teach a two-day writing workshop by Terry Tempest Williams, who has some deeper ties to the country and its people.

Throughout the book, he struggles with feeling superfluous, naive, helpless, and generally ill at ease in the face of Rwanda's terrible history. It's understandable--if he didn't feel this way, dropping in for a few days on Rwanda's young writers in the middle of their country's valiant effort to regenerate itself--he'd be a real jerk. But his uncertainty and ambivalence don't make for the best reading. I wanted him to move through his difficulties as White Man Abroad and step aside, to get out of the picture and show me more without constantly reminding me of how complicated it was to be there.

Maybe this is an impossible thing to ask--after all, part of the problem was that Bass was only there for a couple of days. Who wouldn't feel out of place, presumptuous and conflicted, in a situation like that? So maybe the trip was a bad idea, ill-conceived from the start. As Bass points out in every way possible, how much can two white, relatively privileged American writers really offer the Rwandans who are desperately searching for their voices? How shameful is it for them to turn up now, bearing running shoes and free copies of their books, when what Rwanda really needed was for America as a country to wake up, pay attention, and step in almost twenty years before?

The weight of the 1994 genocide (and the genocides before it--1994 was just one in a bloody series of convulsions in Rwanda) hangs horribly over the whole book. But Bass and Williams do their utmost to wring some value from their presence, to teach and listen and dignify their fellow Rwandan writers with, at long last, an audience. And by the end of their two-day workshop, it seems apparent that something good has happened. Their students leave the workshop feeling like writers, with hope that their stories have been and will be heard. And while it's unclear whether Bass and Williams make good on the schemes they've floated to bring Rwandan writing to a wider (American) audience, this book includes some of the Rwandan student writers' pieces, and its title is taken from one of them.

The rest of Bass's book (or essay, or whatever) is occupied with Rwanda's gorillas, and here his writing relaxes and grows smoother, less anguished, and more concrete. While he's horrified that there are only 780 gorillas left in the preserves shared by Rwanda, Congo, and Burundi (there used to be hundreds of thousands) he writes about the troop they visit with admiration and deep affection. I haven't read much Bass but I've read him on wolves, and he seems by inclination a writer of animals and the natural world, more than a writer of people. In the context of genocide, it's hard to blame him--although arguably the near-extinction of gorillas is a genocide, too.

This is a troubling little book, with a beautiful binding and a compelling core. All I can say, having finished it, is that I hope and want to see more Rwandan stories, written by Rwandans, making it to American shores.

[Lily · Rating 1 out of 5]

If only a book could be given zero stars!

I feel the strange inclination to seek out other writing by Rick Bass to see if he is truly a megalomaniacal idiot, or if Rwanda just hit him so hard that he lost all writing ability and ego control while composing this piece of junk.

Before I launch into the problems with this book, I'll start with two saving graces. 1) I did learn a lot about the Rwandan genocides, and it gave me a clearer picture of the country now. 2) It does include some pieces of writing by Rwandans, at the very back.

Other than that, this book is so awful, I spend the first 50 pages or so thinking it was a particularly dark, irreverent, postmodern joke.

Alright, I initially had typed out a list of attacks, but they were all personal criticisms of Rick Bass, and I don't know the guy, so that seems unfair. Suffice it to say that this text is melodramatic and circuitous. The author often points out his privilege as a white, middle class, American male, but then goes on to say the obnoxious thing anyway (oh woe is me, seeing the dead bodies is hard!). That's like starting a racist joke with, "I'm not racist, but ...". It doesn't work. He also talks about following his wife and daughter's "intuition" even though he knows he's right because it's more important that they believe in their intuition than that they do the right thing. Holy crap, condescending much? When Bass strays from egocentric self-reflection and actually describes the landscape and people around him, the writing can be informative. Then he says something awful, like "oh man but we came here too late guys," and the whole effect is ruined. Yup, you're right, Bass. Rwanda now has nothing to offer. It definitely needs you to come and dump off sneakers, publish your own promises to bring Rwandan writing to America with very little of that writing attached, and self-flagellate while watching gorillas. Actually respect the place as it is now? Pshaw.

[Sean · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reading some other reviews, many have been critical of this book for its difficult wrangle with the writer's own feelings about his experience, arguing that he has has made it about himself and demeaned the Rwandans' own story. While I understand this reaction, to me the book was a sometimes flawed, sometimes distressing, but in the end honest, examination of the mental and emotional dilemma faced by outsiders in confronting situations like this. It evoked for me something of the moral confusion I have felt as a guest in an aboriginal community in central Australia. One's ingrained white middle class values are always seeking to intrude and judge in all sorts of contradictory ways. This book does not claim to be journalism, and so the only really legitimate focus has to be one's own reaction. I am glad I read it even though I found it hard going at times. Less the facts of the genocide than the observations of the apparent life-force of the people.

[Carrie · Rating 3 out of 5]

I love his writing and will read anything he ever writes, even when it's about something that's not really up my alley like wrestling. Or an entire book about one dog. In this case, i still love his writing but am not sure who i'd recommend this book to. I guess anyone who wants to know more about the Rwanda genocide or to a writer who's struggling with the morality of writing about, and potentially benefitting from, genocide and/or first world/developing world power imbalance.

[Anne Tucker · Rating 4 out of 5]

I wasnt really anticipating enjoying this book - i was given it to read and thought i should, but that it would be pretty harrowing. It was as the first section deals very directly with visiting memorials of the people who had died, and some descriptions of the history of this terrible 100 days.

But there was also a fascinating side of the book which was much more unexpected, and very interesting - how as writers he and his colleague tried to support young writers most if not all of whom had been involved in the genocide in Rwanda. This was so revealing aobut how you deal with trauma, with the Americans really uncondifident that they might not be making things worse rather than better, and feeling quite helpless.

Reading other reviews of this book, people have frequently said he is self-obsessed and keeps 'undoing' all his statements and lacking confidence in his beliefs. I didnt find this a problem at all - to me his anxieties were completely understandable and I think it was moving for him to show his fears and inadequacies - especially as he trails far behind hiscolleague (a woman) who seemed much more astute and successful in harnessing the interest of the youngsters.

There is another section of the book which seems quite different - where they go and spend an hour (after a terrifying and difficult journey) with wild gorillas up in a woodland reserve. This is beautifuly described - and I found his conflicted feelings quite understandable here too, and really 'felt' the experience of them all.

I had never heard of this writer - clearly he writes about many environmental things, wild anim,als and landscapes. i dont knoiw how similar his style is with his other books - but i think I will try and read another.

[Meg · Rating 3 out of 5]

Bass' strengths and weaknesses are on full display here. The first half is overwhelmed by feelings of white liberal shame at lack of intervention in the Rwandan genocide; I felt like I was back in college at a post-Hotel Rwanda screening discussion. His first person narrative seems ill-suited to the task of telling the stories of those he meets, of the survivors and children of survivors, all of which get a little crowded or overshadowed in the processing of his own second-hand exposure to the trauma.
But the final portion of the book, in which Bass and his companions visit a reserve for gorillas and have the opportunity to spend an hour viewing a single gorilla band, do the opposite; Bass' own feelings of connection and awe for these creatures put you there, in their presence, attuned to how they move and live despite such a different experience of our own. It's unfortunate he couldn't pull of that same feat with the many Rwandans he likewise met.

[Cathy · Rating 3 out of 5]

A difficult book to read about an American visitor's reactions to the genocide memorials in Rwanda, 17 years after. How do survivors move on? Why did the world, and particularly the U. S., let such horrific brutality go on for 100 days in 1994? "What are the responsibilities of a charmed life?" Contrasted with the awe and wonder, in the same slim volume, of the author's subsequent visit to see the mountain gorillas, where the magnificence of the animals and the the land are beautifully described. A lot of contrasts between nature and man, privilege and poverty, ignorance and terrible experience. Thoughtful ruminations worth reading.

[Jeanne · Rating 5 out of 5]

A difficult subject to read about, but beautifully written.

[Heather · Rating 1 out of 5]

I read this book because I have that cursed inability to stop a book if I make it through a chapter. And I wanted it to be good. As far as topics go it had potential. Rwanda? Good. Genocide? Admittedly sad, but good material. Mountain gorillas? Yes please. Post-genocide writings from a little workshop in Butare? Done. Plus there were pictures.

I've read 3 books in the last 4 1/2 months and they were all for school. Not one for pleasure. As it turns out, the 1 book I read for myself was possibly the worst book ever. Second only to the one about clones I have written somewhere on my "read" list.

Take all the terrible professors you've ever had, especially the ones who were tenured and making good money but tried to act humble- by driving a new Prius and wearing flannels and boots that, as students, we all knew cost a couple hundred easy. The kind who have wives that wear scarves. Gather together all the old dudes who used words unnecessary in normal conversation and waxed poetic about why we're here and what we mean and can we ever be "truly human?". Get the ones that write a sentence that looks like a paragraph and try to emphasize it's ending with a space and then a 4 word sentence. Add a dash of self-absorbed and a itty bit of wish-I-was-still-21 and stir. You still haven't got this guy.

The entire book was about whether or not he (read: I (or you) the reader) should feel guilty about the genocide in Rwanda. Here's a hint: no, I shouldn't. I was a kid. He writes that the babies in their mothers stomachs didn't choose to be born Tutsi or Hutu and he's right. I also didn't ask to be born American. Sure as hell glad I was. No, my country isn't rocking it's power (or intelligence) in a way that's beneficial to... anyone. But I DON'T FEEL BAD THAT I COULDN'T STOP THE HORRIBLE THINGS THAT HAPPENED THEN OR ARE HAPPENING NOW EVERYWHERE.

You know who should feel bad? The guy who was old enough to know what was happening. The guy who has enough cash for a luxury SUV, a 10 day stay in Rwanda to check out mountain gorillas, and the audacity to explain the gratitude on the faces of his students while he was handing out HIS OWN BOOKS at a 2 day workshop. Congrats. You just screwed the world of tons of possible talent.

How the hell could McSweeney's publish this crap? And FOR ONCE, COULD I READ A BOOK OR A STORY ABOUT AFRICA WITHOUT THE WORDS "CHILD(REN)", "BAREFOOT", AND "DIRT ROAD" IN IT? No? Didn't think so.

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

This reads as a self-reflective 'what I did on my holidays'. If you're interested in the story of a man who went to Rwanda for ten days with his family to do a writing workshop and visit gorillas, analysing his white American gaze and emotions on genocide, then this is for you. As such it's interesting, but whilst it sounds like it should be academic with its relflexivity it ends up coming across as a travel diary, and as such could have been done better.

If you're looking for writings from people who actually live in Rwanda, then there are a few pages at the back from the writing workshop that was held in Butare - the title of this book, 'In My Home There Is No More Sorrow', actually comes from a poem by Anne-Marie Nyiransanga - then this is probably not the book for you. One of the outcomes of the workshop was apparently thoughts on how to get more Rwandan writings published though: look forward to those.

[Ben carver · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting perspective on post-genocide Rwanda, although it's never called as such which leads me to think the author is waiting for another. Typical of McSweeney's, hyper-self-critical but necessarily so, explaining why some white guy from Montana is writing a book about post-genocide Rwanda 17 years after the fact. He never puts himself in the shoes of the survivors which I think is a foresight. Enjoyed the focus on the writing movement there, would've liked to see more comparisons to other areas of Africa and emerging arts movements. It was the only hope he provided in the novel amid pages of descriptions about exuberant and happy people contrasted with gruesomely detailed atrocities. The poems were wonderful, and albeit only three or four pages of them, they make the book worth purchasing.

[Max Shmookler · Rating 3 out of 5]

Rick Bass does a first-rate job of conveying his own conflicted and sorrowful feelings about the Rwandan genocide, which, at least in the Western imagination, has taken on a solidified presence as another instantiation of absolute-evil-meets-Western-failure-to-take-action. He's fresh, honest, and humble and he's there to teach a writing seminar to a bunch of ambitious young Rwandan writers. But his seminar is only two days long and his trip is ten. Part genocide tour, part creative writing seminar, part visit to the Virunga National Park, where the author and his family see the regal but endangered gorillas. Because of the wide range of topics and themes, all oddly thrown together in the framework of a ten-day trip to Rwanda, the book aches to be broken up into three separate essays each of which could be introspective and engaging in its own right.

[Elizabeth Desole · Rating 3 out of 5]

The authors set out (with tennage daughter in tow) to teach a writing class in Rwanda. They even realize that there is an underlying post-colonialist undertone to the endeavor.I do applaud the author and his wife for their large hearts. Although there were truly some touching moments (tender and horrific) in this book, overall I found it to be too hyperbolic and conflicted. There were lots of passages that the author was so busy second-guessing himself that I just wanted to stop reading to get away from his hand-wringing. Lots of overpraising everyone he meets in Rwanda and then worrying that he is overpraising to make up for being a white Westerner. I understand the compulsion but it got tiring.
Brief warning:Some of the stories of the past were absolutely harrowing and not for the faint-hearted

[crowjonah · Rating 1 out of 5]

The first 170 pages make a great effort to steal the thunder of the last 10, which hold a meager sample of the actual work produced by the Rwandan writers in Bass' workshop. Do yourself a favor and read those first. Then, if you must, wade through the rest of the guilt-ridden toe-stepping that occurs throughout the book. There was a brief moment of magic during the gorilla bit, which just makes the failed emotional impact of the genocide part all the more troubling. Also, if you look really hard there are a few pieces of what might pass as attempts at fatherly wisdom, but for a book that winds up being more about Rick Bass than anything else, they too feel like a missed opportunity whose detection took some desperate inference on the part of this disappointed reader.

[Kenneth]

There aren't many books that I've disliked so much I couldn't finish, but this is one of them. Bass treats the Rwandan Genocide as some sort of topic for tourist consumption. He speaks of himself and his family incessantly, filling this short tome with constant self-laudatory praise, yet he indulges in levels of self-immolation (he can't remember what he was doing when the Genocide happened or he remembers that he once thought of Rwandans as "others" when he was a child) that almost drip with the sheer happiness this "self-effacing" obviously brings him.

For greater and more appropriate works on Rwanda, try Gourevitch's superlative "We wish to inform you that tomorrow we will be killed with our families" or Jean Hatzfeld's "Machete Season" and "The Antelope's Strategy."

[Fernanda · Rating 1 out of 5]

I read it to learn more about Rwanda from a personal experience. But the "personal" part is really lame. The reflections are so obvious and repetitive, and when not obvious, they just reflect how superior the writer feels among Rwandans - even if he stresses how he loves and cares for these people. It's truly embarrassing to read his "why didn't we come before?" a hundred times... Although you have to admit he's just very open and honest about his ignorance.

[Brian Pagano · Rating 1 out of 5]

I did learn a lot about the genocide in Rwanda and a little about gorillas. Otherwise, this book is pretty weak. I'm glad McSweeney's published it as I would not have read up on this topic otherwise, but I'm also glad the book was short. I could give the guy a break for weak writing and...until I saw that he was writing instructor. And, even if the rest of the book had been up to snuff, the passage on intuition alone would have lost it two or three stars.

[Kristen · Rating 2 out of 5]

I picked this up because 2 of my dear friends are currently in Rwanda visiting. I wanted some more idea of what they were experiencing. I'm glad that I read it, but it was somewhat boring at times. I didn't like his style of writing. But there's importance to the story he was telling.

This isn't for the faint of heart. There are many graphic details.

Not sure if I'd recommend it. Im sure there are other books on the same topic that are written better.

[Hilary White · Rating 4 out of 5]

I learned a great deal about the genocides and cultural norms in Rwanda and I liked Rick Bass's idea that there are only two stories to write: one is a stranger comes to town, the other is someone leaves town. I had a problem with the whole section about the writing class, but I still liked the book.

[Erin · Rating 2 out of 5]

Author is rubbernecking... Not very self-aware, yet proud enough. Of course it's a difficult task to write about a missionary-like experience in Rwanda. It was just so centered around the author, rather than the extraordinary place and people he was interacting with. It was fine, I just expected better writing from a McSweeneys supplement.

You can have my copy if you want it.

[Joseph · Rating 5 out of 5]

I knew very little of Rwandan history, and this was a great way to bring some of the more well known parts of it home. It left me wanting to learn more, and left me absolutely floored by the paradox of humanity's capacity for committing acts of great evil and of great beauty.

[Sheila Boneham]

This is a small but powerful book, and in many places the writing is exquisite. It is not a quick read--at least not for me--because the subject matter is so difficult emotionally, and yet the book is also hopeful in important ways. I am not rating the book because I don't think stars mean much.

[Waldo · Rating 3 out of 5]

More a 2.5. I didn't find the authors voice or tone to be as annoying as some people, but I did find the last third about the gorillas to be a bit dull. After the harrowing first third, followed by the workshop featuring the survivors, it just seemed out of place and weird.

[Jeff · Rating 4 out of 5]

A powerful meditation about the power of writing to grapple with both natural wonders as well as the darkest parts of the human soul.

[Joe · Rating 2 out of 5]

Very heavy. And the writing isn't all that stunning. It's sentimental without maintaining any intrinsic virtues itself.

[Amy · Rating 2 out of 5]

Let's all talk about Rick Bass's feeeeelings about genocide.

[Gillian Quigley · Rating 1 out of 5]

Good description of Rwandan nature .. Quite patronizing description of the genocide, the people - not a fan overall

[Kate Wyer · Rating 3 out of 5]

review to come.