Apelike levels of consciousness predominate when people are under stress. This is most extreme in the case of war, but also true with the simple fact of an excess population in relation to natural resources and space. In Marechera's drama, the black veteran and the white one have survived the WAR but lost much of their sanity, since they have attempted to seal off their wartime atrocities behind a wall of unconsciousness. The illusion that people maintain is that this can be successfully achieved. It cannot. Uncontrolled regression (for there is a controlled sort), even temporary uncontrolled regression, is costly. Both men were lawyers but have now become tramps. They may have thought the damage they were inflicting was far from home, but it was on women close to them. The pretext for war is that males must protect the women and children close to them, but it is precisely the women and children who are killed by war. At the same, time while the war lasts it seems to free the libido.
I used to suffer from world weariness, but the wall says that too was nothing. I cannot get away from you, though that’s the only thing I want from life, from the whole last ounce of the universe. You also want to get away, but like me, you can’t, and for the same reason. I am your wall, and you are my wall. And the game we tried during the war of mounting each other like dogs in severe heat has not yet been settled. ( p 46)
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