“The boy who harnessed the wind” by William Kamkwamba and Bryan Mealer is an autobiographical book published in 2015. The titular movie based on the novel was directed by Chiwetel Ejiofor and was released for the first time at the Sundance Film Festival in 2019. 

The book: 

The book presents the life of the fourteen-year-old William Kamkwamba in a small village of Malawi in 2001. William is a member of a large family that works on the fields, as the most of the residents of this village do. As the only son of the family, he has the chance to attend school, but not for long, because of his family’s financial problems that make it difficult for William to continue schooling, as his education is not for free. Fortunately, even if he is not a student any more, he manages to visit the school library in order to study and work on some of the library’s science books. This is when he comes into contact with the theoretical part of sciences, as he already had a good reputation for repairing radios (practical part). Nonetheless, luck is not on his side, as although he has found an interesting field (science), he is not able to interact with this domain for a while, as a big hunger bursts out. This is probably the most intense part of the whole book, as William narrates us the difficulties that they went through because of the non existence of food supplies. People in this period are described dying, stealing food, fainting, waiting for hours in a queue for some grain and attacking each other. Also, actions that in the so called “western countries” are considered irrational and old fashioned, are depicted in this country, where people do not believe in sciences and logic, but show faith to spirits and good or bad luck, as they strongly maintain that these forces control the crop production and consequently their lives. After the end of the hunger period, William is fortunately able to continue his interaction with sciences and he manages to create an irrigation ditch for his father’s fields, as well as he eventually harnesses the wind, by creating a windmill that powered his house with electricity. At the end, the book describes the scholarship that was offered to William for his great achievements and innovations. 

The film:

The settings (year, country) are left the same, but some radical changes can be easily detected in the movie adaptation. Firstly, William, in the movie, has only one sister that eventually leaves from the village with William’s teacher. So, we can easily understand that in the film, William’s right to visit the library was not because of his capacity but because of the love that the teacher had for his sister. Also, the presentation of the hunger period was much lighter in the big screen adaptation, probably because of the fact that such realistic pictures would be very execrable for the audience. Furthermore, William’s successful future is not described in the book’s extent, but the story basically ends at the construction of the windmill.

Film VS Book:

One the one hand, some really good points were made in the film. To begin with, the book focused only on William’s life and story, but the film pays attention to other interesting side stories as well, such as the love story of his sister and the dilemma that she faced (to live with her beloved one, or to help her family) and the relationship between William and his father and their fights. Secondly, both English, which is the official language of Malawi, and a malawian dialect are used. English is used in the biggest part of the movie, as the production is foreign as well, but the malawian dialect is used in the more intense and personal scenes, when people can best express themselves in their own language (as it happens in reality). Moreover, at the end of the book, there are lots of pages that are basically acknowledgements to the Americans that helped him become famous and successful. Personally, we found this part a little bit exaggerating, as the developed world would not help and pay that attention to a regular citizen of the developing world, but only to a profound talent as William. However, this part is omitted in the film, so it is more balanced. 

On the other hand, the book includes some great advantages. The novel depicts the hunger period much better, as it creates feelings of pity or even disgust and thus, it makes us feel the difficulties that they faced under our skin. In this way, we can feel the beat of this way of thinking, as well as this lifestyle that people from developed countries could even imagine. Also, due to the fact that it does not include many side stories, we can understand very well William’s way of thinking and behaving. Therefore, the book comprises a much more cohesive story, with more meaning and beat.

In conclusion, “The boy who harnessed the wind” is not really well known, both as film and book, but they inform us greatly about this completely different world, that one day should be equal to ours.