John Wain was born in England in 1925 and became a university lecturer before he became a writer. He wrote poetry, plays, short stories and novels. He mainly wrote about ordinary people and their problems. His criticism of society resulted in him being called one of the ‘angry young men’ of the 1950-60s. He died in 1994.
There are three characters in the story: Mr Willison, Mrs Willison and their thirteen-year-old son, Rob. Mr Willison is determined that Rob should become good at sports and develop his body, because he never had that chance when he was young. Mrs Willison doesn’t agree with this plan.
The story begins when the father and son are going for a bike ride and the father pushes his son to cycle further, even though the boy is tired and wants to rest. He encourages the boy by saying there is a surprise waiting for him at home – he has bought a boxing “punch-ball” so that his son can practise boxing. The boy is exhausted when they return home. The mother is annoyed with the father as she feels that he is pushing the boy too hard.
The father wants Rob to train with the “punch-ball” so that he can get strong enough to be selected for the rugby team at school. Rob tells him that the team has already been chosen and he has not been selected. The father’s disappointment is relieved when Rob says that he has been selected to box for the school instead. The mother is very angry that her husband wants the boy to box, as she feels that it is a dangerous sport. The father, however, is very happy about it and looks forward to the boxing tournament with great excitement. He puts all his energy into training his son every day.
On the day of the boxing tournament Rob complains of stomach pains. His mother wants to get a doctor but, instead of calling the doctor, the father phones one of Rob’s teachers and discovers that the school does not do boxing. The story ends with Mr Willison realising that Rob has lied about the boxing tournament.
The story title, Manhood, points to the main theme of the story – questioning what manhood and masculinity mean. Different versions of masculinity are offered in the story. On the one hand we have the father’s version, which sees manhood in terms of physical strength and skill. Contrasted with that is the version that the father was offered when he was young. This involved a man working hard and getting qualifications so that he could have a secure job. The mother, however, doesn’t mind that her husband is not “manly” and thinks that her son should not be pushed so hard physically as he is still only a boy.
Note:
Besides the theme of ‘manhood’, another theme is how people’s failure to communicate openly and clearly can lead to unfortunate events. The theme of lack of communication is evident when Mr Willison shows no insight into the fact that he should not force his own will on Rob and live his dreams through him.
Another main theme in the story is that the boy is dominated by the power of his father. But Rob is too young and immature to stand up to his father, so he tried to please him, even though he is deceitful in doing so.
The story starts with Mr Willison and Rob taking a bicycle ride in the country. This event shows how the father pushes his son beyond his physical limits. He forces Rob to continue riding even when the boy is exhausted. The rest of the story takes place in the home of the Willisons, where the tension between Mr and Mrs Willison rises.
From the start of the story it is clear that Mr Willison has an inferiority complex (feels that he is a failure) because of his lack of training in sports when he was young, and that he was not able to develop his physique (his physical body). He becomes obsessed with the idea that Rob will only become a man by being good at sports. With this in mind he constantly advises, instructs and encourages his son to do the things he never had the chance to do when he was young.
Mr Willison puts Rob under a lot of pressure to exercise and train. Rob is passive and does not stand up to his father, but Mrs Willison does not like it. She complains about it and tries to protect her son. This creates the rising tension in the story. The complication in the story is that Rob’s mother and father have opposing ideas about what is best for Rob. This creates conflict in the relationship between them. An example of this is when each of the parents talks of “my big night”. To the mother, “my big night” means the night her son was born, the most important event in her life. This contrasts with the father, whose “my big night” means the night his son will take part in a boxing tournament and make him proud. He feels he is getting a second chance to live his life again, through his son.
The climax of the story is the day of the tournament, when Rob complains of stomach pains just before the tournament. He and his mother think that he is suffering from appendicitis (infection of the appendix). Instead of getting the doctor the father phones one of Rob’s teachers only to discover that the school does not do boxing. Clearly, Rob has lied to his father.
There is no resolution to this story as we are not told what the father says to his son after finding out the truth about the boxing tournament. The story ends with an anti-climax, as the father “put down the telephone, hesitated, then turned and began slowly to climb the stairs”. The words “hesitated” and “slowly” tell us clearly of his disappointment when he realises that his son has been lying to him. It could also be that he realises why Rob lied to him and he climbed the stairs in a sad and accepting way. He was not angry with his son but is perhaps embarrassed for having forced his son to lie when Rob found himself in such a difficult situation.
There are three characters in the story:
Mr Willison is the protagonist in the story, as he is the central character and controls the actions that take place. Mrs Willison opposes his plans and actions, so she is the antagonist in the story, while Rob is caught in the middle between his parents.
Mr Willison wants the best for Rob, but his attitude causes Rob to resort to deceit and telling lies in the end, even though he tries to please his father. Rob is passive and submissive - he doesn’t stand up for himself but knows he will get support from his mother against his father’s plans. It could be argued that he is too scared and weak.
Mr Willison is strong-willed and obsessed with training Rob. This one-sided view stops him from realising that Rob is not interested in sport. If he was a more mature and sensitive father he might have understood his son better and not pushed and manipulated him. Perhaps then he would not have allowed such a situation to develop. His attitude could be said to have made the boy submissive and ultimately dishonest. Perhaps Mr Willison has missed the point, which is that being a man involves good sense as well as physical strength.
Throughout the story Mrs Willison is opposed to her husband’s behaviour towards and treatment of their son. It could be argued that Mrs Willison was being too protective of Rob and not allowing him to stand on his own feet.
The main stylistic device that the writer uses to show us more about the characters is through their dialogue rather than through descriptions or the thoughts of the characters. An example of how the dialogue shows the tension between the characters is when Mr and Mrs Willison have a disagreement about what is best for Rob:
“What nonsense. You’re taller than I am and I’m –”
“No son of mine is going to grow up with the same wretched physical heritage that I –”
“No, he’ll just have heart disease through over-taxing his strength, because you haven’t got the common sense to –”
Notice how they don’t allow each other to finish their sentences, adding to the sense of tension and mis-communication between them.
The narrator is not one of the characters in the story, so the narrative is told using the third person. The narrator refers to the characters as he, she or they. This third person point of view helps the reader see the story from a wider perspective than from only one character’s view point.
Note:
The words the writer uses and the way they are used also help to carry meaning in the story. For example, Mr Willison’s enthusiasm for training Rob is shown in the way he orders Rob about:
“Don’t lie there,” said his father. “You’ll catch cold.” “I’m all right. I’m warm.”
“Come and sit on this. When you’re overheated, that’s just when you’re prone to –”
“I’m all right, Dad. I want to lie here. My back aches.”
“Your back needs strengthening, that’s why it aches. It’s a pity we don’t live near a river where you could get some rowing.”
And later, he forces Rob to punch the punch-ball:
“Take a punch at it,” Mr Willison urged.
“Let’s go and eat.”
“Go on. One punch before you go in. I haven’t seen you hit it yet.”
Mr Willison’s relationship with Rob is based on the son being forced to do what his father wants him to do, without being able to negotiate.
By his use of words the writer indicates that Rob is not completely happy and just puts up with all the good intentions of his father. The writer describes the boy: “falling silent”; Rob “lay like a sullen corpse” (simile); he “looked horribly like the victim of an accident” (simile); “A slender shadow”. Rob never really tells his father honestly how he feels and this leads to further deception later.
Mrs Willison opposes Mr Willison’s plans for Rob. The tension between them is shown by words such as: “glaring hot-eyed at each other”; and “her eyes brimming with angry tears”.
At the end of the story Mr Willison comes to a realisation when he phones Rob’s teacher. The use of the words: “With lead in his heart and ice on his fingers” help to emphasise his shock. He realises that Rob has lied to him, to them all – and that he may partly be to blame. He also realises that he has failed to fulfil his dream.
Note:
Throughout the story the writer makes us aware of how Mr Willison tries to keep Rob’s coaching on track by the tone of his upbeat and encouraging advice (often from what he has read, not what he himself has experienced):
“When fatigue sets in, the thing to do is to keep going until it wears off. Then you get your second wind and your second endurance.”
“If you hit with your left hand and then catch it on the rebound with your right, it’s excellent ring training.”
“No boxer ever went into a big fight without spending an hour or two in bed, resting.”
However, ironically, his tone is not uplifting, but rather creates a note of tension in the story, as Rob does not respond positively to his father’s wishes. Rob is sullen, sulky, silent and mostly not as keen on his father’s plan as the father would like.
The angry and worried tone of Mrs Willison’s words to the father also adds to the unease and tension in the story:
Grace Willison put down the teapot, her lips compressed, and looked from one to the other. “Boxing?” she repeated.
“Boxing,” Mr Willison replied calmly.
“Over my dead body,” said Mrs Willison. “That’s one sport I’m definite that he’s never going in for.”
As the story proceeds she becomes very angry with Mr Willison and the reader realises that their relationship is at a crisis point:
“Go away, please,” said Mrs Willison, sinking back with closed eyes.
“Just go right away and don’t come near me until it’s all over.”
Grace!”
“Please. Please leave me alone. I can’t bear to look at you and I can’t bear to hear you.”
The tone of the last line of the story contrasts with how Mr Willison is characterised earlier in the story:
He put down the telephone, hesitated, then turned and began slowly to climb the stairs.
He is no longer full of energy and enthusiasm. The story ends with a gloomy tone.
Mood: How does this story make you feel? Happy, sad, angry or indifferent? What are the reasons it makes you feel this way?
Summary
Manhood by John Wain
Read the extract below and answer the questions that follow.
Extract A
“When do they pick the team?” Mr Willison asked. “I should have thought they’d have done it by now.” |
Answers to Activity 1
|
Read the extract below and answer the questions that follow.
Extract B
Mrs Willison did not lift her eyes from the television set as he entered. “All ready now, Mother,” said Mr Willison. “He’s going to rest in bed now, and go along at about six o’clock.” I’ll go with him and wait till the doors open to be sure of a ringside seat.” He sat down on the sofa beside his wife, and tried to put his arm round her. “Come on, love,” he said coaxingly. “Don’t spoil my big night.” |
Answers to Activity 2
|
Words to know
Definitions of words from the short story: | |
free-wheeling | riding without pedalling |
haunches | thighs |
fatigue | tiredness, exhaustion |
endurance | stamina |
sullen corpse | sulky, stubborn dead body |
clambered | climbed |
doggedly | with determination |
physique | body |
prone | likely |
rebellion | defiance |
simultaneously | happening at the same time |
mittens | gloves |
landmark | an important event |
tournament | competition |
trials | tests |
acutest | sharpest, smartest |
satchel | school bag |
to limber up | loosen up, prepare |
keened | wailed, said sadly |
louts | thugs |
compel | force |
appendicitis | infection in the appendix, an organ in the body |
jabbering | chattering, chatting |
defensive | apologetic |
queries | questions |
William Somerset Maugham was born in 1874 in Paris. His parents died when he was young and he was sent to live with an aunt in England. He travelled in Europe and eventually trained as a doctor. However, his first novel, Liza of Lambeth, was so successful that he took to writing full-time. He wrote many plays, short stories and novels. He was a very popular writer in his time and one of the most highly-paid writers during the 1930s. He travelled widely and later settled in the south of France. Many of his novels and stories, such as Being Julia and The Painted Veil, have been made into films. He died in 1965.
When the story begins a writer is at the theatre one night where he meets a woman whom he has not seen for 20 years. At that time she had admired a novel he had just published. At the theatre she reminds him of their first meeting 20 years ago.
The writer thinks back to that time, when he was poor and he had to make very little money last for a whole month. The woman had sent him a letter complimenting him on his writing and inviting him to take her to lunch when she was in Paris, where the young writer lived. The luncheon took place at Foyot’s, a very expensive restaurant. Nevertheless, he felt flattered that she wanted to meet him. When the menu came he was startled, as the prices were much higher than he had expected.
Therefore, he was relieved when his guest said that she only ever ate one thing for luncheon. Unfortunately, she went on to order some of the most expensive things on the menu – caviare, salmon, asparagus, peaches, ice cream and champagne. The more food she ordered, the more the writer got into a panic. He tried to economise by only ordering a mutton chop for himself.
As the meal proceeded he began to imagine how he would react if the bill was too large for him to pay. First he thought of claiming that someone had picked his pocket. Then he thought that he would leave his watch at the restaurant and come back later and pay. Finally, when the bill arrived and he paid it, he realised that he had no more money to live off for the rest of the month.
Now, 20 years later, the writer tells us that he had “revenge at last” because the woman now weighs 21 stone (the equivalent of 136 kilograms).
The story title, The Luncheon highlights the importance of that particular event for the writer. It was a very stressful occasion for him, and ended with him having no money to live on for the rest of the month. By remembering this luncheon the writer remembers how young and immature he was at that time. He remembers how flattered he was that the woman showed so much interest in him; and how he agreed to everything she requested - her choice of restaurant, her choice of food – as he was too immature to oppose her.
A luncheon is defined as a formal meal, but it is usually a small one. The woman’s huge meal contrasts with the tiny meal the writer had.
The main themes of story of The Luncheon are the conflict between truth and lies and the contrast between appearance and reality. At the restaurant the woman repeatedly says that she only eats one thing for lunch, but she contradicts herself by ordering more food. At their meeting 20 years later the woman tells the writer: “You asked me to luncheon”. The reality is that she had suggested that the writer “give her a little luncheon at Foyot’s”.
Twenty years ago the writer may have pretended to be more successful than he really was; but he was too proud to let the woman know that he could not afford the meal, so he kept up appearances. He even lied about never drinking champagne, so that he could save some money.
Note:
The main story takes place at Foyot’s, a very expensive restaurant in Paris where French senators dined, and where the writer knew that he would struggle to pay for the meal.
The writer uses the present tense to begin the story, but then takes us back in time to the memory of the earlier meeting with the woman. This literary device is known as a flashback. The main action or plot of the story takes place in the flashback to a past event - the luncheon. The story is structured so that only the beginning and end of the story are told in the present tense.
At that time, 20 years before, the young writer knew the restaurant was too expensive for him, which was confirmed when he saw the prices on the menu. The woman, however, kept ordering expensive things to eat, creating the rising tension in the story as the young man became more stressed. The complication is that the young writer was too afraid to stop the woman ordering more food, even though he knew he could not afford it.
The conflict in the story is created by the tension between the writer’s panic and embarrassment and the woman’s greedy desire to enjoy her meal at his expense.
The writer experienced a great deal of anxiety and panic about how he would pay the huge bill at the end of the meal. As the meal proceeded he began to imagine how he would react if the bill was too large for him to pay. First he thought of claiming that someone had picked his pocket, then he thought that he would leave his watch at the restaurant and pay later to get it back. The climax of the story occurs when the bill finally arrives. He found that he could manage to pay it, but would have no more money left for the rest of the month.
Now, 20 years later, the story finally reaches a resolution as it ends with an ironic ‘twist in the tale’. The narrator tells us that he had “revenge at last” because the woman was now very overweight.
Note:
There are three characters in the story – the young writer, the woman he takes to lunch and the waiter at the restaurant. The writer is the protagonist, the main character. The woman is the antagonist, as she stands in opposition to him and creates the tension in the story. The young writer is very scared of the forty-year-old woman so he allows himself to be manipulated into buying her an expensive meal. He is too proud to tell her that he cannot afford the restaurant, being a young, inexperienced and upcoming writer. His youth and inexperience contrast with the woman’s ruthless, selfish behaviour. He admits that he is flattered that she had admired his writing:
“she seemed inclined to talk about me”
The writer says he was “prepared to be an attentive listener”. This shows how he is easily seduced by flattery.
In the story we only see the woman from the writer’s point of view. He describes the woman in unpleasant terms:
“She was not so young as I expected and in appearance imposing rather than attractive.”
She seemed to have a big mouth and more teeth than she needed and he is repulsed by the sight of her eating the asparagus:
“I watched the abandoned woman thrust them down her throat in large voluptuous mouthfuls”
Apart from the fact that the woman is not truthful, she is also bossy, as she constantly tells him that he is wrong to eat what she refers to as a “heavy luncheon” and to fill his stomach with “a lot of meat”. She has no sensitivity, as she does not see that one chop is not a “heavy luncheon”, in contrast to what she has eaten.
The woman has no understanding of or insight into the writer’s dilemma. When he leaves only a small tip for the waiter (which is the only money he has left), she thinks he is mean. At the end of the luncheon she does not understand that the writer is telling the truth when he says he will “eat nothing for dinner”. It appears to her that he is joking and she, therefore, calls him a “humorist”. At the end of the story we see that the woman has never admitted the truth to herself about her eating habits, because after 20 years of excessive eating she is now obese.
At the end of the story we see how, 20 years later, the writer has changed and feels differently about the woman’s behaviour. He is not, as he admits a “vindictive” man, as he did not do anything to her, or say anything to show how unfairly she had treated him. However, he is comforted that circumstances (“the immortal gods”) made her pay for her greedy self-indulgence. Now he can look at her without fear or anger, but with “complacency” (self-satisfaction), because clearly years of eating so much have resulted in her being very overweight.
The only other character mentioned in the story is the waiter. The writer feels that he is “ingratiating” and “false”, which makes him seem as if he only wants to please the woman. The waiter has a “priest-like face”, which gives the appearance that he is very serious, and perhaps also intimidating to the young man. It seems that the young man was in such a panic about paying the bill that he thought the waiter was working against him by encouraging the woman to order expensive food. In reality, he was perhaps simply being a good, attentive waiter.
Note:
In the story the writer emphasises how the woman contradicts herself by saying one thing but doing another. The repetition of her words: “I never eat more than one thing” or “I never eat anything for luncheon” are used each time just before she decides she wants to order something else to eat. The narrator does this to indicate how the meal progressed. The more food she ordered, the more he began to panic.
In contrast, the writer only orders a mutton chop and drinks water instead of champagne. The contrast between the two characters and what they eat highlights the differences in their experience of the meal. Both were not being truthful, but for different reasons: the woman was not telling the truth because she was pretending she was not greedy and the writer was not telling the truth because he was too proud and afraid to tell her that he did not have much money.
The more food the woman orders the more anxious the writer becomes. The tension builds in the story very effectively so that the reader also starts feeling anxious, until the point in the story when the bill finally arrives.
The story is narrated from a first person perspective. The narrator is the older writer, remembering an event that took place 20 years before. He is able to see how young and immature he was at the time; and how manipulated he was by the woman.
Note:
Some examples of figures of speech in the story include:
At the beginning of the luncheon the tone is friendly and polite. The narrator is feeling generous and encourages the woman to order food at the restaurant. As the story progresses he becomes more depressed and the tone becomes anxious, as reflected in these words:
“My heart sank a little.”
“I fancy I turned a trifle pale.”
“Panic seized me.”
The tone lifts again in the last paragraph of the story when the narrator tells us that the woman, 20 years later, has become very overweight. This ‘twist in the tale’ is told in a light-hearted way that contrasts with his anxiety in the rest of the story.
Mood: How does this story make you feel? Happy, sad, angry or indifferent? What are the reasons it makes you feel this way?
Read the extract below and answer the questions that follow.
[The narrator and his guest are about to order their meals.]
I was startled when the bill of fare was brought, for the prices were beyond my means. But she reassured me. |
| sensitive; polite; sincere; manipulative |
Answers to Activity 3
|
Read the extract below and answer the questions that follow.
[The narrator and his guest are finishing their meal.]
“You see, you’ve filled your stomach with a lot of meat” – my one miserable little chop – “and you can’t eat any more. But I’ve just had a snack and I shall enjoy a peach.” |
Answers to Activity 4
|
Words to know
Definitions of words from the short story: | |
bill of fare | menu, price list |
caviare | expensive fish eggs |
effusive | enthusiastic |
airy gesture | light-hearted wave of the hand |
mortifying | humiliating, make feel ashamed |
succulent | juicy |
voluptuous | self-indulgent |
discoursed | discussed, talked |
ingratiating | trying to please |
intimidating | scary, frightening |
contradict | go against, oppose |
manipulative | influence, control |
flattered | feeling pleased after being complimented |
humorist | joker |
Nadine Gordimer (1923-2014) was a South African writer who wrote many short stories and novels. Most of her work concerns the political situation in South Africa. She often spoke out against apartheid and censorship. The Soft Voice of the Serpent comes from her first collection of short stories, published in 1952. She won many international prizes for her work. In 1991 she won the most important prize a writer can win, the Nobel Prize for Literature.
A 26-year-old man has lost his leg. While he is trying to get used to this situation, his wife often wheels him into the garden. As he sits in the garden he thinks about his missing leg. He hopes that one day he will be so used to the loss of his leg that it will feel like it has always been gone.
In the garden one morning, when his wife gets up to fetch some tea, she accidently knocks a locust. The young man watches the locust try to move, and he notices that it has lost a leg. He feels that he and the locust are experiencing the same situation – they both have to cope without a leg. The realisation that he is not alone makes him feel much happier.
When his wife returns with the tea, he shows her the locust and jokes about the fact that they both have a leg missing. The wife tries to touch the locust with a stick and causes it to suddenly fly away. The man realises that he had forgotten that, unlike him, locusts can fly. Once again he feels alone.
The title of the story brings to mind the biblical story about Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. In the Bible story the serpent tempts Eve to do what she has been told not to do, with the result that she and Adam are thrown out of Eden. The use of alliteration in the title (the repetition of “s”) reminds us of the hissing sound that snakes make.
In Gordimer’s story the locust is like the serpent. It tempts the man in the story into feeling that he can cope with his situation. Just as Adam makes a mistake by believing in the serpent, so the man makes a mistake in believing that the locust can help him cope.
These biblical references indicate that the story is an allegory.
In an allegory the characters and events become symbols because they also express a deeper, often spiritual or moral, meaning. The symbolism of the locust and garden is moral. The garden in which the man sits is like Eden as it is a peaceful, beautiful place where he can think and come to terms with his disability.
The man who has lost his leg is struggling to come to terms with his situation. He finds some comfort when he notices that the locust is also struggling to cope without one of its legs. At the end of the story the man realises that he must not depend on others, but must learn to cope on his own.
The themes in the story include:
The story is set in a garden, where the man’s wife wheels him every day. The garden reminds us of Eden. Just as Adam was in Eden before entering the wider world, so the man can adjust before going out into the world with one leg:
Perhaps there was something in this of the old Eden idea; the tender human adjusting himself to himself in the soothing impersonal presence of trees and grass and earth, before going out into the stare of the world.
At the start of the story we learn what the complication is: the man has to get used to having only one leg. Sitting out in the garden in a wheelchair every day gives him a lot of time to think about his missing leg. He reads a book in order to distract himself and not to feel overwhelmed by his loss.
The tension rises in the story through the man’s mental struggle to get used to the loss of his leg. This is mirrored by his wife’s reaction to the sudden arrival of a locust. She is afraid of it and jumps up, knocking it away. When she goes inside, the man notices that the locust has lost a leg and is struggling to walk. He immediately identifies with the locust’s physical defect. In some ways, his identification with the insect contrasts with his relationship with his wife. She caused the locust to lose its leg, and so he uses the locust’s dilemma to make fun of her. He teases her by saying:
“Don’t encourage it to self-pity”
The climax of the story takes place when the locust suddenly flies away. The situation does not have a happy resolution because the man feels foolish and let down when he remembers that locusts can fly and he can’t. Perhaps he also realises that he has to face his situation alone.
The main characters in the story are the man and his wife.
The man is the main character or protagonist in the story. He has recently lost his leg and is having to face a new life without it. Mostly, he shares little about his internal emotional and mental conflict with his wife.
The wife is the antagonist in the story. She tries to support her husband by taking him into the garden and looking after him. She does not speak to her husband directly about the loss of his leg. She is, however, the cause of the locust losing its leg; and of the locust flying away. By doing so, she deprives him of hope and some comfort through a sense of shared experience with the locust. He has to face his loss alone again.
The locust is also a character in the story. The writer emphasises this by the way the other characters refer to the locust:
It looked like some little person out of a Disney cartoon.
“isn’t he a funny old man?”
“The poor old thing”
The man identifies strongly with the insect. He studies it very closely. It comes to represent his own suffering and challenges. By talking about the locust the man and his wife are able to talk indirectly about the man’s loss.
The writer does not give the characters names or describe what they look like, because the main focus is on the complication – the man trying to cope with the loss of his leg. Neither the man nor the woman makes direct references to the lost leg; in fact, at the beginning of the story, they hardly talk at all. The man’s distress is internal – he tries to come to terms with his condition in his mind. Although he feels very fearful and powerless he does not talk about it to his wife.
After a couple of weeks the man starts to take more notice of his surroundings in the garden: the trees, the birds. Then he studies a locust very closely. The description of the locust in the story is very detailed. The writer does this to help the reader feel empathy for the locust, just as the man has empathy for it when he realises it, too, has lost a leg.
The only dialogue between the man and his wife is about the locust. The locust becomes a symbol of what the man is experiencing – his anxiety, his need to cope and become independent, and his hopefulness when he sees how well the locust is coping without a leg. Their identification with the locust is shown in the way they talk about the locust. The man says:
“I’ve been watching it, and honestly, it’s uncanny. I can see it feels just like I do!”
“Funny thing is, it’s even the same leg, the left one.” She looked round at him and smiled.
“I know,” he nodded, laughing. “The two of us ...” And then he shook his head and, smiling, said it again: “The two of us.”
The writer emphasises the link between the man and the locust by repeating the line “The two of us.”
The narrator is not one of the characters in the story. The narrative is told using the third person. The narrator refers to the characters as “he”, “she” or “they”.
The writer uses descriptions of nature to show the man’s internal feelings. The man remembers when he was a young carefree boy, swinging in a tree, and this memory gives him hope:
A first slight wind lifted again in the slack, furled sail of himself; he felt it belly gently, so gently he could just feel it, lifting inside him.
Here, the writer uses the metaphor of a sail on a boat opening in the wind, to describe his feeling of hope.
The writer uses figurative imagery in the description of the locust. Its body is compared to an aeroplane in this simile:
flimsy paper stretched over a frame of matchstick, like a small boy’s home-made aeroplane.
The locust’s movements are compared to a man’s in another simile:
Just as a man might take out a handkerchief and pass it over his brow.
The woman compares the locust to an old man in an extended use of personification:
“Shame, isn’t he a funny old man”
“The poor old thing”
The woman does not realise that her pity for the locust is an extension of her unspoken pity for her husband. He does not want her pity and his irritation becomes clear in his use of sarcasm in response to her comments about the locust :
“Don’t encourage it to self-pity”
“Get another little chair made for him and you can wheel him out here with me.”
“Or maybe he could be taught to use crutches.”
At the beginning of the story the tone is gentle and calm. The garden is seen as a good place for the man to recover:
the tender human adjusting himself to himself in the soothing impersonal presence of trees and grass and earth
However, the tone changes slightly when the writer describes how difficult it is for the wife to push the man’s wheelchair into the garden, indicating that she is also having difficulty adjusting to his situation. As we witness the mental and emotional struggle the man faces, the tone becomes gloomy.
Later, the wife causes the locust to lose its leg. When the man watches the locust struggling to cope without its leg he gains a sense of hope that he, too, will overcome his loss. His tone of speech becomes more hopeful.
However, when his wife begins to express sympathy with the locust, the man becomes irritable and sarcastic. This tension rises until, at the end of the story, the locust flies off and there is a pause:
There was a moment of silence.
The tone changes here and becomes hopeless again, as the man is left again with a feeling of loss and he says to her in a harsh tone: Don’t be a fool.
Mood: How does this story make you feel? Happy, sad, angry or indifferent? What are the reasons it makes you feel this way?
Summary
The Soft Voice of the Serpent by Nadine Gordimer
Read the extract below and answer the questions that follow.
[The lady wheels the man into the garden.]
| A first slight wind lifted again in the slack, furled sail of himself; he felt it belly gently, so gently he could just feel it, lifting inside him. So she wheeled him along, pushing hard and not particularly well with her thin pretty arms – but he would not for anything complain of the way she did it or suggest that the nurse might do better, for he knew that would hurt her – and when they came to a spot that he liked, she put the brake on the chair and settled him there for the morning. That was the first time and now he sat there every day. He read a lot, but his attention was arrested sometimes, |
Answers to Activity 5
|
Read the extract below and answer the questions that follow.
[They talk about the locust.]
“Get another little chair made for him and you can wheel him out here with me.” |
Answers to Activity 6
|
Words to know
Definitions of words from the short story: | |
fervently | eagerly |
furled sail | sail that is folded up |
arrested | stopped, put on hold |
compellingly | forcefully, powerfully |
unobtrusive | not noticed, not obvious |
annealment | strengthening, healing |
lugubrious | sad |
hypnotic | making somebody feel controlled, unable to get away or look away |
dread | fear |
armour | metal clothing worn in battle |
kinship | connection, similarity |
pulsations of a heart | beating of a heart |
effaced | withdrawn |
aperture | hole, opening |
reproachfully | disapprovingly |
loathed | hated |
compassion | sympathy, pity |
solemn | serious |
inquisitive | curious |
unnerved | afraid |
Christopher van Wyk (1957–2014) wrote poetry, stories and autobiographical works. He is best known for his autobiographical novels Shirley, Goodness and Mercy and Eggs to Lay and Chickens to Hatch, as well as a children’s illustrated version of Nelson Mandela’s Long Walk to Freedom. As in Relatives, many of Van Wyk’s stories are based on family relationships and the community he came from. In 1996 he won the Sanlam Literary Award for this short story.
In the story a 21-year-old writer goes down to the Cape. He spends a week in Cape Town, then visits his family in Carnarvon. After two weeks he gets bored and decides to return by train to Johannesburg.
In a train compartment he meets three friendly men and they exchange stories. When they leave the train the writer is left in the compartment with two brothers who are not friendly. As time passes the writer realises that the brothers are juvenile delinquents (boys from a reformatory). The writer is afraid of them as they discuss how they will kill their brother’s murderer when they get to Johannesburg.
While the writer is thinking about how to get away from the brothers and find another compartment to sleep in one of the brothers asks him about his grandmother. They tell him that he is related to them. The writer is very relieved, as they no longer pose a threat to him.
Three years later the writer reads in the newspaper that the brothers have died in gang-related violence, just like their elder brother.
The title “Relatives” shows that the story is about what family means to people. At first, the writer was afraid of the two boys, who were strangers to him. When he finds out that they are relatives, as their grandmothers were sisters, he loses his fear of them. They no longer seem like enemies to him, as he has a connection to them.
The main themes of the story are:
The main setting is a compartment on a train travelling between Johannesburg and Cape Town where the young writer chats to people.
We are introduced to the writer, who is an aspiring (inexperienced) 21-year-old writer who decides to visit his family in Carnavon in the Northern Cape to get information about his roots. He wants to write a “family saga” (history of his family).
After two weeks he becomes bored with the dry, dusty place and conversations that are repeated over and over and decides to return home to Johannesburg.
On the train back to Johannesburg he meets:
The three friendly young men ask him about his journey to the Cape, and he tells them a story about it which he had already told his relatives in Carnarvon. He believes that the story is excellent because he feels that it has all the necessary basic features of a good story, passing what he calls his litmus test.
The writer tells them the story of Georgie, whom he met on the way from Johannesburg to Cape Town. Georgie told him a story about how he had killed a man (the story within the story), as a warning to the writer not to try to steal his luggage.
The comic ending and anti-climax of this story (Georgie is publicly slapped in the face by his wife) is thoroughly enjoyed by the young men.
Up until this point the writer is relaxed and enjoying the journey and the company. Then there is a complication. As the writer puts it:
But then my journey took an unexpected turn.
Quite suddenly, and without much warning, the three friendly men leave the train. The writer is left in the compartment with the two unfriendly brothers.
The rising tension in the story begins when the writer looks at the brothers more closely and realises that they are wearing the khaki uniforms worn by juvenile delinquents. He also realises they do not have a guard with them. Suddenly their behaviour changes and they begin to act aggressively – they start talking loudly, swearing, spreading their luggage all over the compartment and littering.
Then they start discussing their brother, who was killed by a gang in Coronationville, Johannesburg. They are on their way to attend his funeral and swear to take revenge on his killer. The brutal and violent way they plan to take revenge scares the writer terribly.
The conflict in the story grows:
The tension within the writer is now so great he cannot even eat.
The story reaches an amazing climax when one of the brothers recognises him as “that clever boy who used to read books and write stuff”. Their grandmothers were sisters, so in fact the writer and the two brothers are relatives. From then on he begins to relax and enjoy the journey.
The resolution to the main story and the story told by the brothers comes three years later, when the narrator reads in the newspaper about “rampant gang crime in the streets of Western Township and adjacent Coronationville”. The two brothers who had “never reached twenty-one” had been stabbed to death in the violence, and were now “in the same graveyard as their brother, killed three years ago”.
The narrator is the writer. He is the protagonist, as he is the main character. The two brothers, his relatives, are the antagonists in the story.
The brothers contrast with the writer in every way. For example, while the writer tells a funny story about a man who pretended to be a murderer, the brothers are plotting a murder in real life.
In a train compartment (which is the main setting for the story) the different passengers also form a contrast to one another.
The three young men who are carpenters or builders are very friendly to the young writer. It is to them the writer tells the story about Georgie.
The story makes use of the stylistic device of “a story within a story”. The bigger story is of the young writer visiting his relatives in Carnarvon to write a family saga. This is the outer frame of the story. His experiences with the people in his compartment on the train back to Johannesburg form the inner frame of the story. The centre frame is the story of Georgie, which the writer tells to his companions as comic relief.
The narrator is the main character in the story. The story is told from the first person point of view (“I”).
The way the writer uses language conveys meaning in the story. For example, at the beginning, when the narrator is visiting his elderly uncle, the description of the old men emphasises the slow pace of their lives:
conversations consisting of long, trailing life histories that made the old men in their elbow patches stammer and squint into the past from behind their thick spectacles
The conversational, chatty tone of the characters when telling their stories together with the use of dialect is very effective. For example, in the story of Georgie, his wife greets him by saying: “Ses maande en djy skryf niks, phone niks, not a blerry word van djou.” The Cape Coloured use of a combination of English and Afrikaans is very effective, as it gives us a sense of the rhythms and pronunciation of this speech.
The narrator’s fear is conveyed not only through his thoughts, but also by using many short sentences, which are very dramatic. For example:
I began to worry
He knows what I’m thinking, I thought.
My companions glared at me again.
I had no appetite.
The final sentence of the story, in particular, is very clear in its message about the unfortunate effect of gang crime: “They had never reached twenty- one.”
The reader is given insight into the characters through the vivid descriptions of their appearance. For example, the two brothers are described as having “sandy hair that had been cut so short that the hairs grew in sharp italic spikes”. Here, a metaphor is used to compare the short, bristly quality of their hair to italic writing.
In the line, “When the train slithered out...”, a metaphor is used to compare the train to a snake sliding along the ground.
In the story the writer uses dialogue and descriptions to show how the tone changes in the story. For example, when the narrator meets the young men on the train the tone of their conversation is friendly and happy:
their conversation was ... punctuated with laughter and inane arguments.
In contrast, the two brothers’ conversation has a dark tone – it is full of swearing and details about how they will murder their brother’s killer:
They no longer muttered but spoke loudly, spicing their conversation with vulgarities.
The light-hearted tone at the beginning of the story changes to a dark and sombre tone as the story goes on. The story ends on a note of sadness, as it brings to mind the theme of the tragedy of gang crime. The death of the young brothers highlights the tragic waste of life that is the result of gang violence.
Mood: How does this story make you feel? Happy, sad, angry or indifferent? What are the reasons it makes you feel this way?
Summary
Relatives by Chris van Wyk
Read the extract below and answer the questions that follow.
[The narrator is remembering his journey.]
Then followed an hour’s drive to Carnarvon by way of long, hot, dusty, potholed roads past waving, poor people on foot or pushing bicycles, and carrying bundles of wood or things wrapped in newspaper. |
Answers to Activity 7
|
Read the extract below and answer the questions that follow.
[The narrator tells his fellow passengers about Georgie Abrahams.]
He threw the remains of the dead man out of the window in the dead of night, and wiped the blood carefully from the windowpane, the green leather seat, the floor. When the conductor questioned the whereabouts of the missing man, Georgie merely shrugged and uttered a melodious “How should I know? Nobody asked me to take care of him.” |
Answers to Activity 8
|
Words to know
Definitions of words from the short story: | |
family saga | family history |
meandering | rambling, winding |
dredged up anecdotes | remembered old stories |
prominently | importantly |
exuberant | energetic, full of life |
inane | foolish, silly |
supercilious | arrogant, proud |
undertones | quiet talk |
conniving | plotting, scheming |
fugitives | people running away from the law |
flamboyant | vivid, colourful |
elementary | basic |
vulgarities | swear words |
juvenile delinquents | young criminals |
caterer | person who serves food |
rampant | out of control |
futility | uselessness |
Es’kia Mphahlele (1919 – 2008) was born in the slums of Pretoria and went on to become a world famous writer, educationist, artist and activist.
He only began attending school regularly when he was 15 and went on to finish high school by private study. In 1945 he taught at Orlando High School in Soweto. As a result of his protests against Bantu Education he was fired from his teaching post. He eventually joined Drum magazine in 1955, where he made a name for himself as a serious writer.
In 1957 Mphahlele went into exile, at first in Nigeria. Here he completed his first autobiography, Down Second Avenue (1959), which was banned in South Africa.
Mphahlele went on to get his doctorate from the University of Denver, USA, in 1968 and was nominated for the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1969.
He finally returned home from exile in 1977, where he went on to found the University of the Witwatersrand’s African Literature Department - the first department of African Literature in the country - in 1983. He is widely celebrated as being the Father of African Humanism.
The story takes place in the industrial part of a city during apartheid, where a young woman called Zodwa works at a coffee-cart. She sells coffee and pancakes to the workers who pass by. One day there is a strike at the nearby Metropolitan Steel Windows Ltd factory. The striking workers march in the street where Zodwa’s coffee-cart stands. She is so absorbed in the strike that she doesn’t realise that the marching crowd is getting bigger and more restless. There is conflict between the apartheid police and the black people who are striking.
One of the strikers, a young man named Ruben (whose nickname is China), helps to move Zodwa’s coffee-cart away from danger of the crowd. Zodwa is very grateful to him and offers him coffee and food. This is the start of the friendship between Zodwa and Ruben. After the strike China loses his job. As their relationship develops, China gives Zodwa the nickname Pinkie, because her skin is peach-coloured. China finds another job at a shoe factory. When he gets paid by his new employer China takes Pinkie to choose a gift from a cheapjack’s shop. The cheapjack is a man named Naidoo. Naidoo clearly likes Pinkie and he starts coming to her cart for coffee. One day when he cannot pay he gives Pinkie a ring in exchange for coffee and cakes. When China sees the ring on Pinkie’s finger he gets very jealous and accuses Pinkie of being in love with Naidoo.
China pulls out a knife and points it at Pinkie’s throat. She thinks he is going to kill her. But then China realises that he is frightening Pinkie. He apologises to her and leaves. He never sees Pinkie again, as three days after this, Pinkie and all the coffee sellers are chased away from the area by the police. When China comes back to visit her she is gone. All he can do is hope that one day they will meet again.
Note:
The story is focused on Pinkie, the coffee-cart girl in the title of the story. Although the title is about Pinkie, everything that happens to her is caused by the realities of the apartheid system. For example, she is caught up in the conflict between the apartheid police and the oppressed black workers, and it is only because of China that she is not hurt. Later in the story she is forced by apartheid laws to move to another place to sell her coffee and pancakes.
The main themes are:
The story is set in an industrial area in a city during apartheid. Throughout the story the harshness of apartheid shapes the lives of the characters. We are constantly aware of the poverty in the city and the fact that the lives of the people are worth little. Pinkie tells China that unless he accepts her coffee and buns he will “starve to death in this cruel city”.
The story starts with the strikers marching. The writer’s description of the march already gives a sense of tension. In the middle of the chaos is Zodwa, who seems calm as she watches the marchers from her coffee- cart. It is only when one of the coffee-carts gets knocked over that she reacts. “She climbed down from her cart, looking like a bird frightened out of its nest.” China helps to move Pinkie’s coffee-cart before it gets damaged.
Against the background of the strike and unrest China and Pinkie start a quiet friendship. When China finds another job he promises to buy Pinkie a gift. They go to a cheapjack’s shop to choose the gift. Naidoo, the cheapjack, takes a liking to Pinkie and starts to visit her to buy coffee. The complication in the story is that Pinkie has two admirers: China and Naidoo. China is shy and is not able openly to tell Pinkie that he loves her. Naidoo is more direct and able to chat and joke with Pinkie more easily.
China’s jealousy of Naidoo creates the rising tension in the story. One day China notices that Pinkie is wearing a ring. She says Naidoo gave it to her to pay for three days’ worth of coffee and cake. China’s jealousy becomes so great that he accuses Pinkie of being in love with Naidoo and threatens her with a knife. This is the climax or crisis point in the story.
China then realises that he is scaring Pinkie, and he apologises to her. He leaves.
The story does not have a clear resolution as Pinkie is forced by apartheid laws to leave the area three days later. When China comes back some days later she is gone and he is left with his dreams of how things might have been.
The main characters in the story are Pinkie, China and Naidoo.
Pinkie is the main character or protagonist in the story. She is called “Pinkie” by China because she has a “peach-coloured face”. This is ironic, because apartheid oppressed black people on the basis of the colour of their skin, and yet here is a black woman with light-coloured skin. It points to how unworkable the system of racial oppression really was.
Pinkie is a shy and gentle woman and seems to accept the harshness of her life. She is small and seems fragile. The writer uses descriptions of small creatures when describing her:
looking like a bird frightened out of its nest
She panted like a timid little mouse cornered by a cat.
China is the antagonist in the story. He too has had a hard life. In the past he was in jail. He is not able to express his emotions well with words. Instead, he is quick to get angry and use violence. He seems to feel that he ‘owns’ Pinkie and is jealous of her having any other friends. His jealousy causes him to threaten Pinkie.
However, China is able to show some remorse for the way he treats Pinkie.
He is sorry for frightening her and says to her:
“I pray you never in your life to think about this day.”
Both Pinkie and China have difficulty letting each other know how they feel about each other. This is mainly because of the cruelty and hardships of the apartheid city in which they live. It makes gentle emotions like love seem dangerous and they both “panicked at the thought of a love affair”.
From the start, Pinkie is a bit afraid of China – he attracts and repels (drives her away) her at the same time:
She felt “a repelling admiration”.
She felt he was the kind of man who could be attractive as long as he remained more than a touch away from the contemplator;
China also carried on “a dumb show”, by not telling Pinkie that he loved her:
Pinkie and China panicked at the thought of a love affair and remained dumb.
The seriousness of China and Pinkie’s relationship is contrasted with Naidoo’s ability to chat easily and joke with Pinkie. His anecdotes “sent Pinkie off into peals of laughter”. Naidoo’s relationship is a source of jealousy for China. He suspects that Naidoo likes Pinkie and thinks that Pinkie is in love with Naidoo.
Naidoo also gives some comic relief to the story, as he mispronounces words for comic effect.
The relationship between Pinkie and China is explored through the use of dialogue and descriptions.
Dialogue works to give us an immediate idea of the characters’ thoughts, feelings and attitudes. Another technique that the writer makes use of is contrasts. For example, the love of China and Pinkie contrasts with the harshness of their world.
In addition, the writer also contrasts aspects of their personalities. For example, at first China seems frightening to Pinkie:
There was something sly in those soft, moist, slit eyes, but the modest stoop at the shoulders gave him a benign appearance; otherwise he would have looked twisted and rather fiendish.
There was something she felt in his presence: a repelling admiration.
The violence of China as opposed to the sweetness of Pinkie is shown right at the beginning of the story when, even though he helps Pinkie, China is seen as one of the violent strikers:
Almost rudely he pushed her into the street, took the cart by the stump of a shaft and wheeled it across the street,
When China first looks carefully at Pinkie he notices her fragility:
His eyes travelled from her small tender fingers as she washed a few things, to her man’s jersey which was a faded green and too big for her, her thin frock, and then to her peach-coloured face, not well fed, but well framed and compelling
Another contrast between China and Pinkie is when China takes her to choose a gift for herself. It is typical of her character that she would buy something pretty such as “a beautiful long bodkin, a brooch, and a pair of bangles”. It is also in character for China to buy something harsher for himself such as “a knife, dangling from a fashionable chain”.
Note the contrasting images and personification in the description which follows, which shows the many emotions China and Pinkie feel for each other:
Within, heaven and earth thundered and rocked, striving to meet; sunshine and rain mingled; milk and gall pretended friendship; fire and water went hand in hand; tears and laughter hugged each other in a fit of hysterics; the screeching of the hang-bird started off with the descant of a dove’s cooing; devils waved torches before a chorus of angels.
At the end of the story the writer uses ellipsis twice to emphasise the incompleteness of the story:
The writer uses a third person point of view to tell the story. This approach allows the reader to learn about the characters from what they say and do. It also allows us to appreciate how the political setting explains so much about them.
The way the writer uses words and descriptions helps to convey meaning in the story. For example, the writer uses many figures of speech and sound devices in the story:
Right from the beginning of the story we are made aware of the harshness of life.
The tone created by the strike is one of confusion and danger:
The crowd moved like one mighty being, and swayed and swung like the sea.
Grimy, oily, greasy, sweating black bodies squeezed and chafed and grated.
We are constantly aware of the poverty and grime in this part of the city. The tone of the words the writer uses to describe the area and the people is despairing:
A dreary smoky mist lingered in suspension, or clung to the walls; black sooty chimneys shot up malignantly
The old shopkeepers are described as having:
a vague grimace on their faces, seeming to sneer at the world in general
Later in the story the tone of fear is emphasised by the writer’s description of China threatening Pinkie with a knife:
At that very moment she realised fully the ghastliness of a man’s jealousy, which gleamed and glanced on the blade and seemed to have raised a film which steadied the slit eyes.
At the end of the story the coffee-carts are empty and deserted. Their emptiness emphasises China’s loss of Pinkie. Yet the story ends on a hopeful tone as we read that China hopes that one day he will see Pinkie again:
We’ll meet in town some day, China thought. I’ll tell her all about myself, all about my wicked past; she’ll get used to me, not be afraid of me any more …
Mood: How does this story make you feel? Happy, sad, angry or indifferent? What are the reasons it makes you feel this way?
Read the extract below and answer the questions that follow.
[China and Pinky meet again after the violent strike.]
“Oh!” She gave a gasp and her hand went to her mouth. “You’re the good uncle who saved my cart!” |
Answers to Activity 9
|
Read the extract below and answer the questions that follow.
[China attacks Pinky in her coffee-cart.]
At that very moment she realised fully the ghastliness of a man’s jealousy, which gleamed and glanced on the blade and seemed to have raised a film which steadied the slit eyes. Against the back wall she managed to speak. |
| jersey; guilty; ring; happy; compassionate; jealous; aggressive |
Answers to Activity 10
|
Words to know
Definitions of words from the short story: | |
chafed | rubbed against |
brandishing | waving in a threatening way |
malignantly | viciously |
tremulous | shaky |
contemptible | worthless |
buddha | 5th century Indian philosopher |
grimace | scowl |
resented | felt bitter about |
artless | innocent |
dumb show | action with no words |
cheapjack | someone who sells goods that are very cheap |
bodkin | an ornamental pin |
rhapsodies | enthusiastic comments |
elated | delighted |
menacing | frightening, threatening |
mystified | confused |
ominous | threatening |
Daniel Canadoce (“Can”) Themba (1924–1968) was born in Marabastad in Pretoria. He studied at Fort Hare University and later moved to Johannesburg, where he worked as a teacher and journalist on Drum magazine. Many of his stories are about the lives of the people in Sophiatown in Johannesburg where he lived. This was a mixed- race suburb which was very vibrant during the 1950s, but it was later destroyed by the apartheid government. In the early 1960s he moved to Swaziland, where he died a few years later.
The narrator is at Dube Station in Soweto on a cold Monday morning, waiting for the train to Johannesburg. All his descriptions of the station and people emphasise his depression, which he feels is shared by all the people around him.
When he gets onto the train he sits opposite a huge man. When the train gets to Phefeni Station a young woman enters the carriage and sits next to the narrator. Soon afterwards a tsotsi jumps onto the train and begins verbally harassing the girl. When the girl reaches her stop and wants to get off the train the tsotsi prevents her and slaps her. She tries to get away from him by jumping over the narrator but the tsotsi follows her.
No one dares to say anything to stop the tsotsi, until an older woman starts shouting at the men and calling them cowards. This causes the tsotsi to swear at the woman. This angers the huge man sitting opposite the narrator and he gets up and moves towards the tsotsi.
The tsotsi pulls out a knife and cuts the big man’s chest and arm. The big man is enraged and, in spite of his injuries, he grabs the tsotsi and lifts him up. He throws him out of the train window.
Everyone is shocked, but the incident soon becomes just another event on the morning Dube train.
The title focuses on the train journey rather than on any characters in the story. The writer intends us to see the train journey as a comment on the lives people experience. Even when bad things happen people just accept them. The incident on the train happens to people no one knows or is concerned about. It soon becomes:
Just an incident in the morning Dube train.
The main themes of this story are:
The train passengers do not at first take action when they are faced with gangsterism and violence. Nobody stops the tsotsi from harassing the girl, or prevents the tsotsi from stabbing the big man, or stops the man from flinging the tsotsi out of the window. The large man who takes action against the tsotsi also behaves in a violent way, which is not a solution to the social problem of crime.
Perhaps the writer is saying that violence has become so common that people no longer see it as a problem:
too many passengers had seen too many tragedies to be rattled by this incident.
People have become so used to violence that they are not shocked by such incidents. They consider them as a break in their dull lives. Although the narrator is also guilty of not getting involved, the writer uses him to convey the message that the people are too used to crime and too passive to fight against it.
The story takes place at the Dube station and on the Dube train. It is on the train trip from Dube to Johannesburg that the events involving the girl, the tsotsi and the huge man take place.
The narrator links the train trip with life in general:
the prospect of congested trains filled with sour-smelling humanity, did not improve my impression of a hostile life directing its malevolence plumb at me.
At the beginning of the story the narrator gives a description of the environment at the station and the people who, like him, feel depressed on that Monday morning. The faceless, nameless people add to his feeling of despair.
When the narrator gets on to the train he describes the passengers more individually. The writer describes the huge man who sits opposite him, a young girl who gets on the train later and a tsotsi who sees the girl and comes to harass her.
The tsotsi’s harassment of the girl is the complication in the story. It creates the rising tension, to the point where the huge man gets up to intervene, after the tsotsi insults a woman who yells at the men nearby to stop the tsotsi. When the tsotsi draws a knife it creates panic in the carriage:
the woman shrieked and men scampered on to seats.
The climax of the story occurs when the tsotsi stabs the big man who confronts him. The man then picks the tsotsi up and flings him out of the train window.
The story ends with a negative and disturbing resolution because, although the problem with the tsotsi has been dealt with, the violent action of the man is also a criminal act. The narrator of the story comments at the end of the story:
Odd, that no one expressed sympathy for the boy or the man.
The main characters in the story are people who are part of the crowd on the train:
The men in the carriage “winced. They said nothing, merely looked around at each other in shy embarrassment”. It is only when the tsotsi swears at the woman, that the huge man becomes offended and takes action. He does not react when the young girl is being harassed.
In the story the huge man, the girl and the shouting woman act as protagonists. The tsotsi is the antagonist as he is in opposition to them. It is the tsotsi’s actions that drive the events that take place on the train.
The narrator of the story notices what is going on with the tsotsi and the girl, as well as all the details of the train journey. The events in the carriage are viewed between station stops. At one point the narrator gives a long description of a bridge and the view of the city skyline, which looks attractive after “the drab, chocolate-box houses of the township, monotonously identical row upon row”.
The writer uses township slang and dialect as ways to indicate the atmosphere of the life he is describing. “Tsotsi”, “Sies” and “Hela, Tholo, my ma hears me, I want that ten-’n-six!” are examples of slang. In the story slang is used by the tsotsis to communicate with each other. It sets the tsotsis apart from the other passengers. The narrator says of their exchange of words:
The gibberish exchange was all in exuberant superlatives.
The narrator tells the story in the first person. He refers to himself as “I”.
The way the writer uses language in the story helps to express meaning.
For example, the description of the big man on the train is significant as it helps us build up a picture of him:
a hulk of a man ... The neck was thick and corded, and the enormous chest was a live barrel that heaved back and forth.
With this metaphor of the man’s chest being an enormous live barrel we have an image of how huge he was and don’t question his ability to lift up and throw the boy later.
The writer’s description of the ‘blue’ Monday includes phrases such as “hostile life”, “the grey aspect around me”, “savagery of the crowd” and “all was wrong with the world”, which give the impression of a dreary day which matches his depression.
The writer uses figurative language to describe the scene and the characters:
From the start of the story the writer gives us a picture of a dreary Monday morning at the station. The narrator surveys the scene with displeasure; the tone of his thoughts conveys a feeling of gloom:
Despairing thoughts of every kind darted through my mind: the lateness of the trains, the shoving savagery of the crowd, the grey aspect around me.
The tone of gloom and despair is continued when the narrator is seated on the train:
the other passengers, looking Monday-bleared, had no enthusiasm about them. They were just like the lights of the carriage – dull, dreary, undramatic.
The writer emphasises how bored and depressed the passengers on the train usually are by contrasting this with how they behave at the end of the story:
[They] break out into a cacophony of chattering.
They were just greedily relishing the thrilling episode of the morning.”
The writer emphasises the fact that people are so used to violence, that they are not so much shocked as excited by what happened on the train. This creates a tone of excitement.
Mood: How does this story make you feel? Happy, sad, angry or indifferent? What are the reasons it makes you feel this way?
Read the extract below and answer the questions that follow.
[The narrator describes a typical Monday morning.]
The morning was too cold for a summer morning, at least to me, a child of the sun. But then on all Monday mornings I feel rotten and shivering, with a clogged feeling in the chest and a nauseous churning in the stomach. It debilitates my interest in the whole world around me. |
Answers to Activity 11
|
Read the extract below and answer the questions that follow.
[The narrator describes the reactions of the passengers.]
Our caveman lover was still at the girl while people were changing from our train to the Westgate train in New Canada. The girl wanted to get off, but the tsotsi would not let her. When the train left the station, he gave her a vicious slap across the face so that her beret went flying. She flung a leg over me and rolled across my lap in her hurtling escape. The tsotsi followed, and as he passed me he reeled with the sway of the train. |
Answers to Activity 12
|
Words to know
Definitions of words from the short story: | |
nauseous | feeling sick |
hostile | unfriendly |
congested | very full |
malevolence | haostility |
fluke | lucky chance |
lackluster | lifeless |
obtrusive | interfering, in the way |
genie | magical spirit |
nefarious | wicked |
ditty | little song |
titillating | pleasing |
lechery | lust |
bawdiness | vulgarity |
precocious | maturing early |
anticipation | expectation |
nonchalantly | casually |
exuberant | lively, high-spirited |
superlatives | highest order or degree |
ungallant | not gentlemanly |
confluence | coming together |
tirade | verbal abuse |
poltroons | cowards |
lewd | vulgar |
helter-skelter | disorderly behaviour |
berserk | mad |
demonical | behaving badly |
cacophony | loud noise |
relishing | enjoying |
harass | torment, molest |
passive | resigned, enduring |
monotonously | repetitively, unchangingly, boringly |
James Thurber (1894-1961) was an American journalist, writer and cartoonist. For many years he worked for The New Yorker, a literary magazine. He lost one eye early in life and, as a result, he was not able to play sports like his peers. To pass the time he would escape into a rich fantasy world. He wrote many stories and memoirs. He often illustrated his stories with his own drawings.
To read more about james Thurber, go to www.ThurberHouse.org
The story takes place on a snowy day during World War 2 (1939-1945) in an American town called Waterbury. Walter Mitty, an elderly man, is taking his wife to town so that she can go to the hairdresser and he can do some shopping while she is there.
As Walter Mitty drives his wife into town, does his errands and waits for her, he escapes into the following five fantasy worlds of his “secret life”. These are:
The title includes the words “secret life”, which encourages the reader to read the story in order to discover what this life is, and why it is “secret”.
A main theme in the story is the conflict between fantasy and reality. Mitty appears to be a hero to himself in his fantasy world, but in his real world he is weak and inadequate.
Another theme is the power of fantasy and imagination. It is only by escaping into his fantasy world that Mitty can find some sense of power and relief from his real world where he is the object of ridicule in his wife’s and others’ eyes. Walter Mitty represents all of us who aspire to a life of glamour and heroics to brighten up our everyday reality.
The setting of the story is an American town called Waterbury. Although much of the action takes place in a car, we also follow Walter Mitty as he goes shopping and waits at the hotel for his wife.
The story is structured so that it has two layers:
Mitty’s real-life problem is to find something to counteract the nagging of his wife and the boredom of the real world. These problems rarely have satisfactory resolutions, because he is often forgetful and feels inadequate.
In his fantasies, however, Mitty has a number of problems and complications to solve. These problems, however, he always resolves brilliantly.
In each of the fantasies Mitty is faced with a situation that is at crisis point or has reached a climax:
In each of his fantasies Mitty plays the part of a highly respected and heroic man. Not all his fantasies reach a resolution as they are often interrupted and he has to return to the real world. In his real life the complications rarely have satisfactory resolutions because he is so forgetful and inadequate. The end of the story is an anti-climax as Mitty is left standing in the rain waiting for his wife. However, even then, he imagines himself to be “Walter Mitty the Undefeated”.
The main characters in the story are Walter Mitty and his wife.
Walter Mitty is the protagonist or main character in the story. His wife is the antagonist as she is mostly in opposition to him. She constantly nags him and reminds him to do things, which leaves him feeling weak and inadequate. For example:
Whenever Mitty does try and answer his wife she implies that he is old or ill:
The character of Mrs Mitty is a good example of a caricature, which is an exaggerated representation of a type of person. She is a typical nagging, bossy wife. She is also an example of a stereotype. She is a stereotype because the writer has not given any additional features to her character.
By contrast, all the characters in Mitty’s fantasies are distinguished by their youth, inexperience or reverence for Mitty:
The other characters we meet in the story besides Mitty and his wife in the real world are mainly like his wife - they are authority figures who make him feel small and pathetic. These are:
At the end of the story Mitty finally escapes from all this torment to a world where he will face the firing squad heroically.
The strength of the story lies in the writer’s use of contrasts.
For example, Walter Mitty is a timid, inadequate, forgetful, absent-minded man who is constantly being picked on by his wife. By contrast, his wife has an attitude of certainty and control. Whereas he listens to her without comment, Mrs Mitty constantly comments on his behaviour, as she thinks he does everything wrong and she knows better.
She often treats him as if he were a child. For example:
“I’m going to take your temperature when I get you home.”
She gives the impression that it is she who will get him home, but in reality it is he who will drive. As a result of being controlled in this way, Mitty feels humiliated and seeks to find an escape from her demands. It is not surprising that his fantasy world forms a pleasurable contrast to his real world. Here, at least, he is the brilliant, brave and dependable hero who saves the day and whom everyone admires.
The narrator is not one of the characters in the story. The narrative is told using the third person.
The way the writer uses figurative language and literary devices is very effective in the story.
The story can be read as a satire revealed to us by the fantasies that Walter Mitty has about himself. The satire works through the irony used throughout the story because, in his fantasy life, Mitty is completely different from what he is in reality. In his fantasies he is always respected and admired for his bravery and ability to save others in dangerous situations. In his real life he is the opposite of this.
Onomatopoeia (words that imitate real-life sounds) is always used in the fantasies. Sounds like “pocketa-pocketa” are used to show the reader that Mitty is in his “secret life”. It indicates the sound of the hydroplane and the aneasthetiser. The “rat-tat-tatting” indicates the sound of guns and flame throwers used by bomber pilots.
Note also the use of grammatical punctuation marks, namely the ellipsis, to indicate when Mitty is entering or coming out of one of his fantasies.
In order to add humour to the story the writer makes use of a number of malapropisms (words that sound like the correct one but are wrong) and neologisms (made-up words). For example, in Mitty’s hospital fantasy the malapropisms “Obstreosis of the ductal tract” and “streptothricosis” sound like medical conditions, but they are not the correct terms. The gun in the courtroom fantasy is called by the neologism “Webley-Vickers 50.80”, but there is no gun with that name in reality.
When the story starts we are in the middle of one of Mitty’s fantasies. The tone in this fantasy is excited and optimistic, conveyed by the writer’s use of multiple exclamation marks:
“We’re going through!”
“Rev her up to 8500!”
“Full strength in No. 3 turret!”
The next fantasy has Mitty in the middle of a life-threatening situation, so the tone is serious, but confident. Later, when he imagines himself facing a firing squad, the tone is scornful, “proud and disdainful”.
This contrasts with the tone Mitty’s wife uses when she speaks to him. She is usually irritable and scolding:
“What are you driving so fast for?”
“Why don’t you wear your gloves? Have you lost your gloves?”
“Why do you have to hide in this old chair? How do you expect me to find you?”
The dreariness of Mitty’s real life is emphasised when Mitty’s wife leaves him waiting in the cold rain while she goes shopping. This creates a tone of sadness – we feel pity for poor, clumsy Mitty as he tries to create a richer life for himself. We almost welcome his last fantasy, when he faces a firing squad, because at least he is strong and brave even though he is facing death.
Mood: How does this story makes you feel? Happy, sad, angry or indifferent? What are the reasons it make you feel this way?
Read the extract below and answer the questions that follow.
[Walter waits for his wife.]
He found a big leather chair in the lobby, facing a window, and he put the overshoes and the puppy biscuit on the floor beside it. He picked up an old copy of Liberty and sank down into the chair. ‘Can Germany Conquer the World Through the Air?’ Walter Mitty looked at the pictures of bombing planes and of ruined streets. 5 |
Answers to Activity 13
|
Read the extract below and answer the questions that follow.
[Walter and his wife drive in to town.]
“I don’t need overshoes,” said Mitty. She put her mirror back into her bag. “We’ve been all through that,” she said, getting out of the car. “You’re not a young man any longer.” He raced the engine a little. “Why don’t you wear your gloves? Have you lost your gloves?” Walter Mitty reached in a pocket and brought out the gloves. He 5 put them on, but after she had turned and gone into the building and he had driven on to a red light, he took them off again. “Pick it up, brother!” snapped a cop as the light changed, and Mitty hastily pulled on his gloves and lurched ahead. He drove around the streets aimlessly for a time, and then he drove past the hospital on his way to the parking lot. |
Answers to Activity 14
|
Words to Know
Definitions of words from the short story: | |
rakishly | jauntily, smartly |
hydroplane | a plane that can land on water |
grossly | hugely |
overshoes | shoes worn over ordinary shoes to protect them from the snow |
aimlessly | without direction |
distraught | worried, upset |
haggard | tired |
glistening | shining |
vaulted | sprang |
insinuatingly | suggestively |
bickering | arguing |
pandemonium | chaos |
lobby | entrance room |
“auprès de ma blonde” | a French song |
erect | upright |
disdainful | scornful |
inscrutable | impossible to understand |
Pauline Janet Smith (1882–1959) was born in Oudtshoorn, in the Western Cape. Her father was a British doctor who came to South Africa in the hope of curing his ill-health. When Pauline Smith was 13, she and her sister were sent away from their beloved Karoo to boarding school in England.
Although she never lived permanently in South Africa again, she visited many times over the next 40 years. During her extended visit from 1913- 1914, she kept a journal which she used later as the basis for her first collection of short stories, called The Little Karoo, for her novel, and The Beadle. Her stories describe the isolated rural areas of the Little Karoo and the lives of the farming people who lived there.
Two sisters, Marta and Sukey, live on a farm called Zeekoegatt with their father, Burgert de Jager. Their mother has recently died of a disease of the heart caused, in part, by their father’s “water-cases”. Their father is always trying to get water from a neighbouring farmer, Redlinghuis, and has spent a great deal of money on legal fees.
In his last attempt to get water their father loses more money than ever and, in order to get water from Redlinghuis’s farm, has to bond some of his lands to Redlinghuis. That means that instead of paying the money he owes, he gives the neighbour some of his land with the intention of buying it back when he has money again. When their father is unable to pay to get the land back again Redlinghuis tells him that he will take Marta as a wife instead.
Sukey is very angry that Marta is being offered to Redlinghuis, but Marta assures her that it is the right thing to do – it will save their father’s farm. When Sukey confronts Redlinghuis and tells him that Marta is too good for him, and that she will offer herself up instead, Redlinghuis tells her that if he can’t have Marta he will take their farm.
When Marta marries Redlinghuis he buys a tent-cart so that he can drive around all day and show off his new wife to everyone – “the wife that Burgert de Jager sold to me”. Marta never complains about her husband, but she is clearly not happy and grows weaker and becomes sickly, until it is obvious she is dying. Before Marta dies, Redlinghuis disappears into the mountains with his gun. His body is found six days after Marta dies.
The story ends the night after the burial, with Burgert de Jager blaming himself for the deaths because of his demands for water. Sukey, however, tells him she will not judge him.
The title of the story indicates that the focus is on the two sisters, Marta and Sukey, who are devoted to each other.
The themes in the story are land, patriarchy, tradition, devotion, obedience, submission, female self-sacrifice, compassion, bitterness, the meaning of sin and the right to judge.
In this quiet rural world the most important source of wealth is land. Owning land for generations is a sign of wealth and standing in society. It is not difficult to understand why Burgert de Jager is so obsessed with keeping his land, and why Marta is ready to sacrifice herself to help her father keep it. However, one of the underlying messages of the story is that it is destructive to attach more importance to land than to the welfare of people.
The setting of the Little (Klein) Karoo is important, even though there are few descriptions in the story. We know that it is a very harsh, drought- stricken world where a strong belief in tradition and obedience to God and family rules the lives of the people. These are also important themes in the story.
The complication in the story arises from the fact that Burgert de Jager has tried for many years to get water from the Ghamka river through a neighbouring farm owned by Jan Redlinghuis and has spent a great deal of money on legal fees. He is so obsessed with this that he does not notice how it is affecting his wife, who dies in his “bitterness and sorrow”.
The conflict between the two farmers creates the tension in the story. Burgert de Jager eventually owes Redlinghuis so much money for allowing the water to pass through his farm that he is forced to make a deal with him - Redlinghuis will either marry Marta or take over the De Jager’s farm. This tension rises in the story when De Jager decides that Marta must marry Redlinghuis to save the farm.
The story reaches a climax when Marta becomes weaker and weaker from the humiliation of her position, and eventually dies. Sukey is very unforgiving towards her father and blames him for the deaths of both her mother and sister. This causes tension and conflict between Sukey and her father.
The resolution to the story only comes after Marta has died and Redlinghuis has shot himself. Sukey comes to understand the goodness of Marta, and she finds some compassion for her father and tells him:
“Do now as it seems right to you ... Who am I that I should judge you?”
The main characters in the story are the sisters, Marta and Sukey, and their father, Burgert de Jager, who are the protagonists. The antagonist is Jan Redlinghuis, the farmer who opposes them and lives next door.
The two sisters are very different from one another, but they have great affection for each other.
Marta is very loving, gentle, unselfish and accepting. She shows this by agreeing to do as her father asks in order to help him save the farm. She tells Sukey:
“if I do right, right will come of it, and it is right for me to save the lands of my father.
Marta is willing to accept her fate. She does not even blame Redlinghuis for demanding that she marry him:
“There is not one of us that is without sin in the world and old Jan Redlinghuis is not always mad. Who am I to judge Jan Redlinghuis?”
Sukey is also prepared to sacrifice herself to save her gentle and passive sister, when she tries to persuade Redlinghuis to take her instead of Marta, but she is much tougher and more judgemental. She believes her father has done wrong in sacrificing both his wife and his daughter, and she tells him that he is at fault. She says to her father:
“It is blood that we lead on our lands to water them. Did not my mother die for it? And was it not for this that we sold my sister Marta to old Jan Redlinghuis?”
Sukey is also very judgemental of Redlinghuis, based on what people say about him. She says to him:
“it is said that you are a sinful man, Jan Redlinghuis, going at times a little mad in your head”
Sukey loses her faith in God as she cannot believe that God would allow the marriage of Marta and Redlinghuis. She tells her father:
“There is no God or surely He would have saved our Marta.”
Burgert de Jager’s obsession with getting water for his farm leads to the death of his wife and his daughter Marta. It also causes the break in the relationship between himself and his daughter Sukey.
Burgert de Jager and Jan Redlinghuis are mostly seen through the eyes of Sukey. They are both seen as obsessive and greedy. However, near the end of the story they both seem to realise they have been wrong and feel sorry about it. Burgert de Jager says to Sukey:
“It is true what you said to me, Sukey. It is blood that I have led on my lands to water them, and this night will I close the furrow that I built from the Ghamka river. God forgive me, I will do it.”
Jan Redlinghuis becomes remorseful when Marta is at the point of death. He says to Sukey before he goes into the mountains and takes his own life:
“Which of us now had the greatest sin – your father who sold me his daughter Marta, or I who bought her? Marta who let herself be sold, or you who offered yourself to save her?”
By saying this, he points to the fact that no one should judge, as everyone has played some part in the tragic events.
The story is told through a combination of dialogue and description of the events, but only from the point of view of the narrator, Sukey. We are not told by the writer what the characters look like, or what the land looks like, or how they view their surroundings, because the focus is on the attitudes and reactions of the characters to the troubles that they experience.
The style of the language in the dialogue is old-fashioned and mimics (copies) the sentence structure of Afrikaans to give us a closer impression of the speakers’ context and culture. An example of this is: “this night will I” instead of ‘tonight I will’ as the writer wants to follow the Afrikaans word order, namely ‘sal ek’.
The first person narrator, Sukey de Jager, is a young girl living on a farm in the Little Karoo. She is strong-willed and the story is told from her point of view.
The way the writer uses words and word order emphasises the meaning she wants to convey to the reader.
For example, repetition is used throughout the story for emphasis:
This emphasises the idea of loyalty and what is appropriate behaviour.
Repetition is therefore used to focus on key themes in the story.
Sukey also uses sarcasm when answering her father’s questions. For example, when he says:
“Is it not wonderful, Sukey, what we have done with the water that old Jan Redlinghuis lets pass to my furrow?”
Sukey answers:
“What is now wonderful? It is blood that we lead on our lands to water them.”
It is also interesting that Redlinghuis’s farm is called “Bitterwater” which
symbolises that his water is not a source of goodness.
The writer also uses an idiom (a clichéd saying) in the story:
“my father’s back was up against the wall”
This means that the father has no options left, he has nowhere to turn.
The writer also uses figurative language in the story. For example:
Here, Sukey’s father compares the water from Jan Redlinghuis to blood because in order to get this water, lives have been lost. ‘Blood’ here could also refer to ‘flesh and blood’ or family.
In this story the narrator’s tone mostly emphasises the sorrow and despair that the characters experience. For example, when Sukey refers to Marta, she remembers her only as having a “still, sad face”.
The writer emphasises this tone of despair near the end of the story when Marta dies at sun-down. It is as if Sukey and her father are entering an emotional night-time.
However, the story ends with a more hopeful tone when both Burgert de Jager and Sukey come to deeper emotional insights. Burgert de Jager finally realises that his actions have caused the deaths of his wife and his daughter, and he asks for God’s forgiveness. Sukey doesn’t scold her father, but says what her sister Marta would say:
“Who am I that I should judge you?”
Mood: How does this story make you feel? Happy, sad, angry or indifferent? What are the reasons it makes you feel this way?
Read the extract below and answer the questions that follow.
[Marta agrees to marry Jan Redlinghuis.]
And she said again: “Sukey, my darling, listen now! If I marry old Jan Redlinghuis he will let the water into my father’s furrow, and the lands of Zeekoegatt will be saved. I am going to do it, and God will help me.” |
| orange; Jan Redlinghuis; Sukey; Grootkops; Ghamka; Marta; Burgert de Jager; Platkops |
Answers to Activity 15
|
Read the extract below and answer the questions that follow.
[Marta has died.]
We buried Marta in my mother’s grave at Zeekoegatt ... And still they could not find Jan Redlinghuis. Six days they looked for him, and at last they found his body in the mountains. God knows what madness had driven old Jan Redlinghuis to the mountains when his wife lay dying, but there it was they found him, and at Bitterwater he was buried. |
Answers to Activity 16
|
Definitions of words from the short story: | |
water-cases | legal cases involving the right to use water |
water-rights | permission to use water from a river or from another farm |
furrow | a channel for water |
cashmere | fine, soft wool |
bond | instead of paying with money land has been used to pay a debt; if the person cannot pay it back the land goes to the person who lent the money |
tent-cart | wagon with a hood |
inspanned | harnessed the wagon to horses so that they could pull it |