The novel Machete Season: The Killers in Rwanda is a book in which Jean Hatzfield dives deep in to the minds of the Hutu, the men that are to blame for the massacre of the Tutsi people. Before reading this novel, I didn’t really know much about the Hutu or the Tutsi. Of course we all know there were killings and murders involved, however I never fully grasped the reason for it all. So, for one to have an actual sit down discussion to deeper understand what was going on in their minds is really interesting. You would think that these literal serial killers wouldn’t be so open to talking about what most would call immoral and evil actions, however somehow Hatzfield managed to get the truth out of these men about the crime-filled genocide they committed. This novel heavily reminds me of Wretched of the Earth, and how Frantz Fannon got to dive into the outcome and trauma of the African people that were colonized. However, one thing I would’ve loved to also see was a sit down with the colonizers themselves, to get a more in depth understanding of what was going through their heads throughout all of those years.
Oppose to Fannon’s Wretched of the Earth, something I got from the novel Machete Season was a bit of that psychopath mindset that I was longing for. I just think it’s really intriguing to understand how a mass murderer thinks. I mean we all know how we’d feel if we were in the middle of being colonized or even if we were to witness genocide. Most of us would be scared out of our minds even though we’ve never been through it. However, normally a regular person does not know what it is like to be a mass murderer like the Hutu, it’s close to impossible to imagine what emotions and feelings they were going through while assassinating people left and right. But don’t you worry, later on we find out exactly how they felt.
I think it was very clever but also gruesome to make the title “Machete Season”. I feel as if it’s equivalent to saying ‘the time where the Tutsis were filled with bullets”. Cruel, but basically truthful. However, instead of a gun filled with bullets it was a knife that was being thrown around to slice bodies and limbs in half. The reason it was given this title is because the machete was the most popular weapon used throughout this genocide.
It all started in April of 1994, where the Hutu were creating genocide against the Tutsis. Hundreds of thousands of Tutsis were being slain, thousands by day. Every day these monstrous Hutu men would wake up and do normal human being things, they’d brush their teeth, wash up, and eat. Then like the psychopaths they are, they would get out there on the field to kill. It was like a daily ritual. The Hutu had to kill a specific amount of Tutsi people by the end of each day. They did what they were told everyday with no disappointment. One thing you could count on them to not do is disobey their orders. They would get in position on the field so when it was time, they’d be ready to aim and fire at their opponents. Although this seemed like such a set plan, it was more of them just getting out there and killing as many Tutsis they’d came encounter with.
In the novel, Jean Hatzfield tells about his interview he had with a number of the Hutu killers. We find out that they are all friends and were mostly famers who each participated in murdering thousands of their Tutsi neighbors. You know how sometimes when you watch a film and the bad guy is getting away, you almost don’t want him to get caught because you build some sort of attachment to the character. I thought that would happen in this novel. I thought I’d eventually have some sort of sympathy for the Hutus, but the more pages I read, the more hatred I built up for them. Further in the book these evil men explain how when they killed, it was something that basically liberated them and made them feel really good. Fulgence, one of the Hutu, furthers my claim and says “The more we cut, the more cutting became child’s play to us, for a few, it turned into a treat, if I may say so.” It seems that these men found joy in killing these people. Not to mention that they were not only killing men but women and children too. By this statement it is clear they had no remorse for their actions. It was then I realized and began to call these men psychopaths instead of just simply monsters. I mean come on, we are all human. What kind of human being doesn’t even feel remorse for taking an innocent child’s life? That’s right, a psychopath. Although some of these men might’ve felt a sense of guilt, it’s not like they stopped what they were doing and walked away from it. Nope they kept on obeying the cruel and evil orders they were given.
Like any other human being with a beating heart would, the only people I felt really sad for in this novel were the Tutsis, and maybe even Hatzfield for having to sit and listen to the seemingly arrogant, remorseless and cruel words of these men. Overall, as I previously stated, I did find this novel intriguing, however I did not finish reading the novel with a sense of relief like I did for Wretched of the Earth. At least in that novel there was a good outcome of more awareness of mental health. Oppose to Jean Hatzfield’s Machete Season: The Killers in Rwanda. But I guess I can say one satisfying reason that I can close this book with a smile on my face is knowing that the world is now aware that these psychotic monsters are not sorry about what they did and whatever the universe gives them, they completely deserve. Just like decolonization, genocide can never go unnoticed.
Joka Oyefeso 