Apartheid - Repudiation of Human Ethos: A Study of Nadine Gordimer’s
Short Stories
Dr. R. Pavithra
Assistant Professor of English
Sona College of Arts and Science,
Salem, Tamil Nadu, India
Abstract:
Man’s
greed for material possessions forced him to drive away animals from their
natural habitat. The minority of human beings has subjugated the majority of
flora and fauna. This colonizing tendency of man did not stop with the
subjugation of nature. A parallel can be drawn between this act of man and the
white man’s colonization of the non-European countries. This paper showcases
how the colonizers subjected the natives to endless misery by treating them no
better than animals. and also shows how the chosen stories are only tasters to
the kind of awakening caused by the literary works of Nadine Gordimer at a
juncture in history when the White majority was continually devising new
repressive measures against the Black minority.
Key words: Oppression, Apartheid, Black, Racial
discrimination.
Essentially man is a social animal. More so in
traditional village where the individual is tied to certain conventions. He is
the part of a whole organism. Whatever happens to him vibrates through the
community and whatever happen to the community necessarily affects the
individual. Nadine Gordimer’s short stories highlights the colonizing tendency
of man where a parallel can be drawn between the act of man and the white man's
colonization of the non-European countries. The colonizers subjected the
natives to endless misery by treating them no better than animals. South Africa
was an existing specimen of this kind of injustice. The natives of South Africa
had separate areas to live in, separate laws to abide by; and separate jobs to
do. The white rulers robbed them of their liberty, dignity, peace, human and
natural resources.
The interpretations of the people with good will
prevailed and the literary works of great writers like Nadine Gordimer fed the
movement started by daring souls like Nelson Mandela. The writer in her was
alert at a very young age to the harsh realities of the apartheid law. She was
consistent and insistent in her fight against the draconian law called
apartheid. She did witness the fall of apartheid in her own life time.
Nadine
Gordimer bloomed into a writer in the milieu of political and social divide.
She contributed to the charged environment as much as that environment
contributed to her growth as a writer. She proved that language and literature
are the most powerful weapons against injustice. The human environment of her country inspired her to write and her
writings in-turn inspired the people who were fighting against the illegal
apartheid. Therefore, one cannot divorce an author’s work from the environment
or the society in which he or she lives. Dominic Head says, "...there is a
relationship between a writer’s creativity and the social context in which he
or she operates.... ln working out her identity as a South African writer, acutely conscious of a political structure
which distorts social reality, Gordimer has had recourse to various
strategies and various literary
gestures.” (Head, l)
Gordimer’s novels and short stories offer glimpses into
the human environment in South Africa during the apartheid regime. Nadine
Gordimer sensed that the discrimination and the great divide between the haves
and the have-nots will result in insecurity to White life. She warned that the
comfortable life of the Whites rested on a rickety foundation. The social
struggles of the Black majority are sincerely recorded in the works of Nadine
Gordimer. More than politics, she discusses the human issues in the
long-drawn-out fight against injustice. The life and works of Gordimer mirror
the theme of the inequality between the classes and the inherent insanity and
bias in the policies oppressions.
Economists caution that too much of
inequality and oppression will lead to insurgency and revolt in the long term.
Johannesburg is a city known for burglars and robbers. The white suburbs are
not safe; the inhabitants of the white suburbs are preoccupied with safety
measures to protect themselves and their property. Just as man has to safeguard
himself against animals that have been deprived of their natural habitat, these
whites are constantly improving on the existing security measures against the
impending attacks by black burglar. This is because of the uneven economic
development. Unmindful of the needs of the Black community, the Whites usurped
their lands and labour. Not resting with that, the White rulers imposed
apartheid upon them making the society unfit. The poverty of the Blacks and the
affluence of the rich Whites made them seek better security systems and burglar
alarms. Apartheid was a policy targeting the natives. The human ethics were
blown to the wind. It was in this context that Nadine Gordimer, in spite of
being a white, supported the anti-apartheid cause. While supporting the sources
of the Blacks, she warned the oppressors about the possible outcomes of
prolonged apartheid policy. A society which is obsessed with security concerns
can never be happy. It is like a house built upon the sand. The house may fall
on the heads of the inhabitants themselves at the slightest provocation.
“Once Upon a Time” is a beautiful short story which
recounts the ways in which a fairy-tale family tries to enhance the security of
their home. When there are riots in the Black neighbourhood, they get
suspicious about strangers. Plaques are put up in front of houses saying, “You
have been warned”. There are police, soldiers, teargas and guns to keep the rioters
away. When there are more riots, they fit electronically
It was the ugliest but the most honest in its
suggestion of the pure concentration camp style, no frills, all evident
efficacy. Placed the length of the walls, it consisted of a continuous coil of
stiff and shining metal serrated into jagged blades, so that there would be no
way of climbing over it and no way through its tunnel without getting entangled
in its fangs. There would be no way out, only a struggle getting bloodier and
bloodier, a deeper and sharper hooking and tearing of flesh (29).
This loop of serrated coil fence is a symbol for
apartheid policy. In the story, the son himself gets entangled in the coiled
fence. The makers of the Apartheid law were wrong. Poverty, unemployment, and
the evil apartheid laws were responsible for turning the Blacks against the
Whites. The White man believed that if the apartheid laws were made stricter,
he could be at peace. But it was just the reverse. This image is relevant not
only to the then African Government, but to all unjust rulers in the world.
After all, great literature deals with universal themes by referring to a
particular experience.
Marriage and sexual relations across the colour line were
made illegal in 1949. As she is rightly called “the warrior of the
imagination”, Gordimer threw imaginary challenges to the rulers by placing
emphasis on the mixed relations. The short stories “City Lovers” and “Country
Lovers” depict the senseless way in which
Works Cited
Gordimer, Nadine. Lump and
Other Stories. Farrar, Straus and Giroux,
1991.
Internet. 10 Oct. 2004.
http://www. Litencyc.com/php/www.LitEncyc.com