70 pages • 2-hour read
All the Glimmering Stars
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Themes
The Psychological Impact of War
Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of graphic violence, suicidal ideation, death, child death, emotional abuse, physical abuse, child abuse, rape, and child sexual abuse.
All the Glimmering Stars explores the brutal and destructive era in Ugandan history during which Joseph Kony pursued building his Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) and mounting an insurrection against the government. Central to his success was the psychological warfare he used to recruit and secure child soldiers for his army. Through Anthony, the novel explores the mental and emotional impact of war as he struggles to reconcile the things he feels he must do for Kony with his efforts to be a “good person.”
The internal conflict that Anthony undergoes throughout the novel emphasizes the psychological effect that Kony and the LRA had on even its strongest soldiers. Anthony is a successful soldier, mastering the skill of signal calling and working his way to the top of Kony’s communications team. The praise he receives from Kony is a primary motivation for his character, as he feels pride in the work he does for him. However, at the same time, he recognizes the brutal acts that Kony is committing and the wrongness of his war. After surviving his first battle, Anthony reflects on it: “Despite the fact that his father had told him that the worst thing a young man could become was a soldier, despite the fact that he still [hates] Kony, Anthony [feels] himself swell with inner pride, and that rare warmth that [surprises] him” (117). These thoughts convey the deep impact that war has on Anthony. He finds that he’s successful at war, but the skills he works hard to develop help facilitate atrocities.
After Anthony finally frees himself from the LRA, his moments of reflection as he sits in the prison cell highlight how deeply his time with Kony affected him. He considers his options: to serve a prison sentence, join the Ugandan Army, flee, or die by suicide. The fact that Anthony even considers fleeing or dying by suicide despite having a wife and two small children emphasizes his interior dilemma, conveying the mental toll that military conscription can take on people, sometimes leaving them reeling and wondering whether they would be better off dead.
For both Anthony and Florence, the guns they use throughout their time in the LRA symbolize the deep-rooted psychological effects of Kony’s manipulation. When they finally escape, both hesitate to drop their weapons, struggling to truly let them go because of the strength of the warning they received as children that the punishment for losing their weapon would be death. Another way Kony manipulated kidnapped recruits early in their capture was to make them participate in the deaths of weaker recruits and then tell them that because they’re “murderers,” civilization will never welcome them back (as Anthony experienced) and that their only chance of survival is with him. Thus, both Anthony and Florence struggle to accept their freedom and finally release Kony’s psychological grip.
The Power of Love to Heal and Transform
Through the love that Anthony and Florence find for each other, they survive and, ultimately, escape from Kony’s influence. The LRA manipulates them into believing that they’re alone. Soldiers commonly take multiple wives, sexually abusing them and committing emotionally to none. They’re threatened with death if they show emotion, form friendships, or acknowledge their past families or friends—as Anthony, Patrick, and Albert demonstrate when they refuse to acknowledge that they know one another. This isolation prevents love or attachment, directing devotion to Kony.
When Anthony and Florence meet after years under Kony’s control, they find a person with whom they can truly talk about his atrocities, reminisce about their lives before the war, and plan a future. As they get to know one another, “[t]hose feelings only [deepen] in the days that [follow] as more stories of their early lives and dreams [spill] out. The war and their captivity in the LRA [are] largely forgotten” (258). For Anthony and Florence, their love allows them to feel human again amid the war. Additionally, as they talk about their families and their childhoods, they find deeper connections to their pasts: “For reasons they [don’t] quite understand, they kept calling up other lessons from their childhoods, looking for the ones that they remembered and used in times of difficulty” (260). What they feel is the connection between their families’ love and the love they now feel for each other. Just as they were driven by the love and support of their parents during their childhood, they’re now driven by that same love for each other.
In addition to their love for each other, the love they received from their parents before the war is a primary source of motivation for both Anthony and Florence. For example, as Anthony stands in the water for training during Gong Two, he focuses primarily on memories of his father, which motivate him to continue to fight as those around him die. Florence often remembers her mother and the support she gave her in becoming a nurse, motivating her to survive the war so that she can fulfill her dreams. In addition, thoughts of her mother carrying her home from the hospital motivate her to carry her children for miles to escape enemy fire.
Ultimately, after Florence and Anthony survive the war, they reunite and reaffirm their love for each other. They’re both on a difficult journey of healing when the novel ends, as they repent for what they have done, learn to move past what Kony did to them (which for Florence even includes forgiving and pitying him), and return to civilization. Central to that journey is their marriage, to which they recommit despite its roots in the difficulties of the war. In the novel’s final pages, the tone shifts to one of hope as Florence and Anthony celebrate with their friends and family and take the next step toward healing together.
The Journey to Agency and Control
One of the primary ways the LRA controls people is by taking away their agency. As a bildungsroman, or coming-of-age story, the novel explores Anthony and Florence’s growth as they learn to take back control of their lives. Because they’re children at the start of the novel, Kony’s forces easily manipulate and control them; only as they mature do they learn to have agency. However, they must be careful about asserting it.
From the moment Anthony is kidnapped, the soldiers’ brutality robs him of his agency. When he tries to escape within the first few days, he’s taken before Bacia and watches as two other children who tried to escape are mercilessly killed. Barely escaping death himself, from that point forward Anthony feels he has no choice but to remain with the LRA. Additionally, the collective murder of James and the picture that the soldiers claim they took of each of them stepping on him deepens Anthony’s feelings of helplessness. He’s repeatedly told that he’ll have no place in society if he tries to return—even if he survives being hunted by Bacia.
What motivates Anthony’s change is the knowledge he gets from Mabior. For the first part of the novel, Anthony does what he can to fit in with Kony and the other soldiers, dutifully following orders and feeling pride in his accomplishments, while realizing that these steps are necessary to survive. However, after Mabior tells him about the voices of suffering, he starts to recognize them within himself and gains a clearer understanding of who Kony is—and how to separate himself from the evil deeds they commit. For example, upon seeing Kony suffer after losing his wife, he notes:
He knew he could probably ease Kony’s pain by teaching him how to recognize the four voices of suffering, the importance of naming them, and the simple methods the old shopkeeper had shown him to quiet them enough to think clearly. But Anthony said nothing, did nothing (344).
This moment marks a significant change in Anthony’s character and his final step toward gaining agency. He finally recognizes who Kony is; instead of trying to help or impress him, he lets him suffer, escaping shortly thereafter to gain his freedom.
Similarly, Florence struggles when she loses her agency after being kidnapped, sold as a child bride, and sexually abused. Like Anthony, she initially survives by trying to obey and not anger anyone, even scolding Palmer for not allowing Okaya to touch her breast. When she moves into Okaya’s compound, she makes special efforts to do chores and assist his wife Mariama. However, after being forced to have sex with Okaya, she recognizes the futility of submitting to their demands. From that point forward, she works as a nurse, takes control over her marriage by choosing to marry Anthony, and plots with him to escape. After escaping, Florence’s change comes when she chooses to forgive Kony for what he did to her and realizing that this harrowing chapter of her life led her to Anthony. By letting go of her anger and moving forward in her life with Anthony, she finally regains her full agency.
Through Anthony and Florence, the novel explores the importance of free will and choice. While they undergo extreme brutality at Kony’s hands, one of the worst things they experience is loss of agency. They lose control of their bodies and their freedom, as Kony manipulates them into believing that they have no choice but to remain in the LRA. In the end, their vision of a happy future together sustains their hope, and they regain their freedom and reunite.
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