Boys and girls come out to play ... soldiers

By Daniel Nelson

Liberian Girl

Image by Royal Court

It’s Martha’s grandmother’s idea, a desperate ploy to escape being caught up in the conflict as they negotiate a checkpoint on a desperate flight to safety. But of course there’s no escape – not for Mamie Esther, who is murdered, or for her 24-year-old granddaughter, who is forced to commit atrocities. One way or another, one bunch of fired-up killers will get you.

The play at the Royal Court Theatre in London doesn’t shed light on the factions in the 1989-96 war, or why and how they came to be fighting, but it takes on one story out of millions and follows it through.

And what a story. Plucked from the checkpoint queue, the cringing, crying Martha has to literally fight for her life, rape another captured girl as a military rite of passage, undergo training with a brutal commander, play and tussle with her fellow fighters – particularly Killer and Double Trouble.  It’s hard being one of the boys, because she’s not, but also because there are other differences: she’s had a few years’ education (and has read, or started, John Steinbeck’s Of Mice And Men), whereas they are not book people.

Despite the danger and deceit, and the danger of the deceit, she manages to cling on to her humanity amidst a system designed to crush it, which is why the story commands the attention and does not descend into a litany of despair.

It’s strong stuff, though, and if you are the braveheart section of the audience that’s standing (you can elect to sit) you will occasionally be waved aside imperiously by boys with guns to make space for scuffling characters or commandeered equipment.

A few people have walked out – perhaps shocked by staged rape or baulking at the brutalising of young boys. Most people, however, will be moved rather than removed, because the sex and violence is not designed to titillate.

Yes, the issue of child soldiers is shockingly bleak, but don’t be put off, unless it’s Cats you want.  The set, acting and script (by talented Nigerian-British first-timer Diana Nneka Atuona) are top quality, so it’s the twists and turns of Martha’s extraordinary story you are watching, not a lecture. Watching it offers a ‘There but for the grace of god…’ feeling. If it also inspires sympathy, empathy, solidarity, action, or a more generous attitude to the uprooted, whoever they are, wherever they are from, so much the better.

·         Liberian Girl is at the Royal Court Theatre, Sloane Square, SW1, until 31 January, (7565 5000/ http://www.royalcourttheatre.com/whats-on ) and then at the CLF Theatre, Peckham 3–7 February and the Bernie Grant Arts Centre, Tottenham on 10-14 February.