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Lauren Howley English III The National Party introduced apartheid as part of their campaign in the 1948 elections, and with the National Party victory, apartheid became the governing political policy for South Africa until the early 1990 s. The word apartheid means separateness in the Afrikaans language and it describes the rigid racial division between the governing white minority population and the nonwhite majority population. During this time there were many different political views on the basic conflict of South Africa. The views of white South Africans differed from the views of black South Africans on what would be necessary to end apartheid.
Cry, the Beloved Country, a novel written by Alan Paton depicts the collective guilt and friendship over racial prejudices in the story of a black South African. Stephen Kumalo, an aging Zulu minister, travels from his tribal village to Johannesburg, where he finds that his only son, Absalom, has murdered the only son of a white man, James Jarvis. The tragedy connects these two fathers, who later begin to work together in an effort to help the natives of their own village. Paton's Christian-liberal solution to the problems of South Africa were considered hopelessly inadequate by black antiapartheid activists. In the decades of open militancy from the 1970 s, Paton's political views and biblical resonances were doubted by the black readers who were involved in the political struggle. Paton's stress on fixing the problems by blacks and whites working together was not a logical response for the blacks in South Africa.
Paton's solution came to represent an idea in which whites could retain the comfort of their lives while being able to be politically moral or correct. Alex La Guma, the author of In the Fog of the Seasons End expresses the need for a more militant effort to change things. He focuses on the struggle that the blacks are having and how they work together in the underground movement to destroy apartheid and the white world of privileges that supports it. Although their solutions to the political problems at hand are different both Paton and La Guma show compassion towards the current situation and take a stand through their novels. Cry, the Beloved Country is a book about agitation and turmoil of both whites and blacks over the white segregation policy of apartheid.
The book describes how understanding between whites and blacks can end mutual fear and aggression, and bring reform and hope to a small community of Ndotsheni as well as to South Africa as a whole. Edward Callan, a noted critic of Alan Paton, believes this fear is the reason that racial struggle cannot be resolved: the no less real problem of the subconscious springs of racial attitudes that, tinged with the bondage of fear, inhibit justice and the inclination to restore (Edward Callan p. 32). The depth of this fear is a constant theme throughout the book: I have one great fear in my heart, that one day when they turn to loving, they will find we are turned to hating (Alan Paton p. 40). Paton gives the people of South Africa a new modern Bible, where he teaches them to love thy brother as yourself in order to help whites and blacks overcome the fear and misunderstanding of each other. Paton describes the valley where the main character, Kumalo, lives; it is barren and cannot hold the rain.
It is a valley of old men and old women that is deteriorating because the young people are not there to help take care of it (33 - 34). They all leave and go to the mines and the big cities, because the white man has convinced them this is where they belong. The natives move to the cities to look for opportunities, but are only oppressed by the rules and restrictions that the white man has placed upon them: [they] cry for more education, and more opportunity, and for a removal of the restrictions on native labour and enterprise (Paton 109). The whites keep the natives stupid and do not want them to have more money or become smarter. They push the natives down for they fear a better-paid labourer will also read more, think more, ask more, and will not be content to be forever voiceless and inferior (Paton 110). The whites feel threatened by the possibility of equality with the natives even if they theoretically believe equality would be just.
The theme of fear continues throughout the book. Not only are the blacks in fear of the whites, the whites are in fear the blacks. As Edward Callan quotes Fear shows in the eyes of the God-fearing as well as of the evil-doers (Callan p. 32). The white man fears the crimes the natives are committing, but in fact, they are the ones responsible: Johannesburg was afraid of black crime (Paton 52). When the white man takes away the tribal system, he is taking away the moral system of the natives. The reason the natives turn to crime is because their simple system of order and tradition and convention has been destroyed.
It was destroyed by the impact of our civilization. Our civilization has therefore an inescapable duty to se up another system of order and tradition and convention (Paton 179). Although Paton suggest that it is society's responsibility to correct the damage that they have caused, the natives are still left without a foundation for their morals leading them towards a dishonest life. A priest in the novel says, The tragedy is not that things are broken. The tragedy is that they are not mended again It suited the white man to break the tribe, but it has not suited him to build something in the place of what is broken (Paton 56).
The white man fears the natives will become smart and powerful and overcome the superiority of the white race: for we fear not only the loss of our possessions, but the loss of our superiority and the loss of our whiteness (Paton 110). The natives have turned to crime because the white society has destroyed their moral system and there is no where else to turn. Therefore, the whites simply blame the natives for their problems instead of looking for a solution to help them all. The native families are split up so they can work in the mines for the white man. Their purposes in life are clouded because the white man will not allow them any: We shall always have native crime to fear until the native people of this country have worth purposes to inspire them and worth goals to work for. For it is only because they see neither purpose nor goal that they turn to drink, and crime and prostitution.
Which do we prefer, a law-abiding, industrious and purposeful native people, or a lawless, idle and purposeless people? The truth is that we do not know, for we fear them both. (Paton 107). The natives continue working and praying for the dawn of a new Africa: God have mercy upon us. Christ have mercy upon us. White man, have mercy upon us (Paton 89). They hope for a dawn of emancipation, from the fear of bondage and the bondage of fear (Paton. 312).
In Alex La Guma's In the Fog of the Seasons End he has fully developed a novel that represents the basic conflicts of South African life. He, like Paton, focuses on the tension and the problems between the whites and the blacks. However, La Guma does this from the perspective of the blacks in the underground movement. Where Paton expresses the need for blacks and whites to get along La Guma takes the stand that to fight back it the only way to stop this on going problem. He portrays the dynamics of the underground movement through three main characters who are directly involved with the movement. Using these three characters and the characters that surround them and help them La Guma shows the struggle of the non-whites in South Africa.
La Guma begins the novel with a prologue that takes you to the middle of the current events. He begins by setting the scene where Elias, a black leader in the underground movement, is arrested and being interrogated by a white major. He has been arrested for participating in anti-apartheid activities. This prologue starts out with his arrest and torture and at the end of the book ultimately concludes in his death. Through the major and Elias, La Guma portrays the conditions for blacks during this time. In this scene, the major begins to ask him about the movement and uses a friendly, sympathetic tone, like a doctor advising a patient (La Guma 4).
He soon loses this tone there was defect in the disguises; the mask did not conceal all (La Guma 4). After dropping the fake tone he talks to Elias in his real voice and expresses how he feels: you see your people are not the same as we are. We can understand these things, mathematics. We know the things which are best for you.
You want to be like the whites. It is impossible (La Guma 4). La Guma uses the majors speech to show that the whites feel that they are above the blacks and think that they know what is best for them. As S.
O. Asein quotes: La Guma stresses in the majors interrogation the common belief among South African whites in their racial superiority. By highlighting this attitude he succeeds in ridiculing their nativity in think that they know what is best for the suppressed non-whites (Asein p 123). This opening act between Elias and the major is the basis for the novel; it gives background information on the race relations that are currently taking over South Africa.
Kathleen Balutansky quotes that The style and tone of both the prisoners and the Majors remarks introduce the overwhelming tensions portrayed in this novel: more importantly, in representing the essential elements of the conflict in the prologue of the novel (Balutansky p 84 - 85). Elias gives a speech in response to the majors, which La Guma uses to show how the blacks felt as a result of their oppression by the whites: You want me to co-operate. You have shot my people when they have protested against unjust treatment; you have torn people form their homes, imprisoned them, not for stealing or murder, but for not having your permission to live (La Guma 5 - 6). La Guma emphasizes the self-pride and dignity that Elias has in this response. Thus showing the loyalty and determination he has to fighting the resistance, which expresses the extreme need for it. Where as in Cry, The Beloved Country, Paton emphasizes the need for this understanding between whites and blacks and ultimately bringing reform and hope to the entire country.
Paton also portrays through his novel the Christian based idea that changes can come from one man. La Guma shows the need for a group effort to change the situation: There are things that people can do, I am not saying a person can change it tomorrow or next year. But even if you dont get what you want today, soon, its a matter of pride, dignity (La Guma 11). He expresses, unlike Paton, that change is not going to come as a result of one man, thus setting up the importance of the underground movement.
The fear present with everyone in Paton's novel is also present in La Guma's novel. The fear that consumes Beukes and Elias and Isaac, the main leaders of the underground movement, is what drives them to fight the resistance; For a while Beukes was in the crowd on the sidewalk. You could get lost in a crowd; in an alleyway or alone on a street you were conspicuous. Yet he felt his heart beat uncomfortably, and his eyes panned across the faces of the passers-by (La Guma 23).
Even in a crowd Beukes fear arises and he becomes afraid that one of the people might be the secret police. His fear is heightened when he runs into a routine check at a train station. He was carrying illegal flyers for the movement and became consumed by fear: and he waited for the next one while anxiety turned to anger and then back to the scratching worry (La Guma 68). According to Kathleen Balutansky the consciousness of danger generates fear and flight, while the experience of flight generates a sense of despair which, in turn generates the continued necessity of flight/Beukes move is accompanied by fear, and his every rational thought is focused on escape (Balutansky 92).
Beukes fear contains some aspects of paranoia, constantly running from the enemy has elevated his fear of getting caught. His paranoia could explain Balutansky reasoning of his every thought being focused on escape. He cant stay in one place for too long because it will increase his chances of getting caught to he always on the run and always in fear This series of fear and flight as the critic Balutansky put it continues to plague Beukes. Although this fear affects Beukes he does not allow it to break him; I want to go home, I must go home, I want to go home to France. He still felt hollow but it was not the hollowness of hunger, and he realized, with tears prickling his eyeballs, that is was the hollowness of abandonment (La Guma 147). Beukes wants to go home to France for comfort and security, which he does not have out on the streets.
However, by running away from the resistance Beukes is running away from his ultimate chance of freedom. His commitment to the fight is stronger than his fear and desire for escape so he stays and continues to fight. However, Beukes has become isolated and lonely, running from the secret police, and in constant fear: his life had become mysterious rides, messages left in obscure places, veiled telephone conversations. The torture chambers and the third degree had been transferred from celluloid strips in segregated cinemas to the real world which still hung on to its outward visible signs of peace: the shoppers innocently crowding the sidewalks, the racing results, the Saturday night parties, the act of love (La Guma 25).
This shows how Beukes is either on the run or is uncomfortably resting throughout the entire novel. He is forced to move from one place to another constantly looking over his shoulder. On his way to a friends house he is consumed with the though of sleep because he is so tired; he wished the driver would stop talking; right then he not give a damn about politics, the resistance, the revolution; all he wanted was to get some sleep (La Guma 27). He has had to surrender his basic human needs of sleep to continue fighting the resistance. This shows his dedication, willingness to fight and what he had to go through to eventually get freedom. Critic S.
O Asein comments that It is a condition which puts to test the loyalty of the individual to relations as well as to the collectivity. Thus in treating a particular case, La Guma has succeeded in universalizing his comment, on the conditions of the modern man, faced as Beukes is with the menace of blatant violence, in justice and mans inhumanity to man (Asein 128). La Guma portrays to the reader what its like for the modern man like Beukes who is participating in the resistance movement. He shows how the resistance affects the lives of the people involved and what they have to go through and give up to obtain the ultimate goal of freedom. Both Paton and La Guma show the trials and tribulations that the people of South Africa went through during the time of Apartheid. Alan Paton calls for an end to racial injustice, misunderstanding and alienation of black and whites.
Paton took his Christian-liberal view to this novel and expresses his beliefs in unity of the blacks and whites to stop racial discrimination when most people were used to hearing that fighting is the only answer. In contrasting opinion to Paton, La Guma expresses his belief that the blacks must work together to fight the whites. He shows through a series of current situations and flashbacks of three main characters what life was like in the resistance. Both novels show the horrible repercussions of Apartheid and how the affected to people and their townships.
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