A Whole War Inside One Small Body

Abstract

Separation – from your family, your home, your country; a journey – to escape, to return, or an inward journey of healing, self discovery and self construction: these are recurrent themes in the four novels about children and war that are examined in this study of works by critically acclaimed authors Rachel Anderson, Bernard Ashley, Peter Dickinson and Robert Westall. These stories have different wars as their contexts, in different countries and historical periods: Vietnam, the Gulf, civil conflicts in African countries and London gang warfare, but while varying in their approaches, the novels share a richness of setting, characterisation and narrative structure, and a powerful capacity to involve readers emotionally and intellectually. Causes are explained or suggested, but it is essentially upon the far-reaching effects of war in time and place, on ordinary people, the civilian population and children, especially, that the authors turn their attention.