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Cry the Beloved Country
“Cry for the broken tribe, for the law and the custom is gone. Cry, the beloved country, these things are not yet at an end (Paton, 105).” In Cry, the Beloved Country, it is 1946 and the land reserved for blacks in Ndotsheni, a part of South Africa, is drying up. In the novel written by Alan Paton, young men and women begin to leave Ndotsheni for the new city Johannesburg. One of those gone is John Kumalo, a businessman in Johannesburg and younger brother of Stephen Kumalo, a reverend in Ndotsheni. Stephen and John Kumalo differ in their regards for family, religion, and corruption.
Stephen has a brother, sister, and son that left him years ago, none of which writes to him. Yet, he still misses them and hopes for their return. One day, he receives a letter with news about his sister, Gertrude. After discussing the news with his wife, he leaves for Johannesburg at once to find his long gone sister. Stephen and his wife sacrifice their savings for Stephen to make the anxious trip. While in Johannesburg, he finds Gertrude, John, and eventually his only son, Absalom. With no bitterness, he resolves to bring them all back with him but in the end, none comes with him. However, he gained a nephew, the son of Gertrude, a daughter-in-law, Absalom’s newly wedded wife, and an unborn grandchild.
On the other hand, John is the opposite of his brother Stephen. John is no longer living with Stephen’s family due to his decision long ago. In addition, John’s wife left him because he was unfaithful to her. He is now living with a woman who is not married to him. The book shows that family comes second to John because he does not keep in touch with his son, Matthew, anymore. When Stephen comes for ...
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...ndemns the laws that favor white men. Yet, he speaks English instead of Zulu. John is a great speaker that can influence others and can lead riots if he chooses. Nevertheless, every time he riles up the crowd, he backs down for fear of losing his comfortable status. Though he speaks of bad treatment for blacks, he lives contentedly in his home while earning a good pay. He talks and tells speeches of reforms and yet does nothing. As a result, he is just as corrupted as the white man is.
In summary, Stephen and John represent the two clashing cultures of South Africa. Stephen represents the old ways and tries to keep traditional values. John wants the new world and thinks nothing of the old ways. Never could there be two different brothers as Stephen and John. Their regards for family, religion, and corruption clash as a result of the newly rising culture.
Just because people within a family are blood related and living together, it does not mean they are identical in their beliefs and actions. In some cases the generations of people in the family have the same way looking at things and understand the same sets of rules and believe in same kind of moral behavior. Unlike that, in the novel, “The Chrysalids”, the protagonist, David Strorm and his father, Joseph, the antagonist have very different characters and conflicting points of view.
In the beginning of the novel, we meet the Bergson family. As one reads the beginning chapters of the novel, one learns that the Bergson family has dealt with an awful toll on the family. They lost two children in between the births of Lou and Oscar. Not only did they lose two children, who they surely loved dearly, they lost a herd of cattle to a blizzard. They lost a very important plowing horse to a broken leg. They lost their hogs due to cholera. They also lost an important breeding stallion. All of these hardships occurred within a relatively short time of eleven years. Then at the end of chapter two, the Bergson's lost the head of their family in John. With the loss of the father, the famil...
John was one of 3 brothers and 3 sisters. His two brothers were named Paul, and Tony, and his 3 sisters were named Jean, Iris, and Gillian. He was born into a very poor family. He barely had any clothes. In fact, in a recent interview he said he only had one shirt, one pair of pants, and one jacket. His apartment had no indoor plumbing and no indoor bathroom. He slept in one bed with all 5 of his brothers and sisters. John was beaten quite a bit by his father, most of it for stunts like trying to kill his siblings.
Sarah and her mother are sought out by the French Police after an order goes out to arrest all French Jews. When Sarah’s little brother starts to feel the pressures of social injustice, he turns to his sister for guidance. Michel did not want to go with the French Police, so he asks Sarah to help him hide in their secret cupboard. Sarah does this because she loves Michel and does not want him to be discriminated against. Sarah, her mother, and her father get arrested for being Jewish and are taken to a concentration camp just outside their hometown. Sarah thinks Michel, her beloved brother, will be safe. She says, “Yes, he’d be safe there. She was sure of it. The girl murmured his name and laid her palm flat on the wooden panel. I’ll come back for you later. I promise” (Rosnay 9). During this time of inequality, where the French were removing Sarah and her mother just because they were Jewish, Sarah’s brother asked her for help. Sarah promised her brother she would be back for him and helped him escape his impending arrest. Sarah’s brother believed her because he looks up to her and loves her. As the story continues, when Sarah falls ill and is in pain, she also turns to her father for comfort, “at one point she had been sick, bringing up bile, moaning in pain. She had felt her father’s hand upon her, comforting her” (Rosnay 55).
Susan is the youngest of four children, of which only she and her older brother, John, were the only to survive. It is believed that her father, Clark, is responsible for his first two children’s deaths. John was also severely physically abused by Clark and was often given notes to excuse him from gym at school. John and Susan had limited interactions together and John was beaten when he tried to give her food. At the age of eighteen, John ran away to escape his father’s callous abuse, thus leaving Susan to endure
Cry the Beloved Country, by Alan Paton is a novel inspired by the industrial revolution. Paton describes in detail the conditions in which the Africans were living during this time period, 1946. This story tells about a Zulu pastor who goes into the city in search of his son and siblings who left in search of a better life. The pastor sees this immense city where a ruling white group is oppressing the black population. This novel is more than just a story, but it depicts the effects imperialism and the Industrial Revolution had on South Africa. Although the government has intervened to protect the people, some of these effects are still present in our societies.
Would you believe that a theme in a book could relate to every single person in some way? The book Cry The Beloved Country by Alan Patton can be relatable to today’s society in numerous ways. The themes of the book can relate to people in other situations. One theme that relates to people in today’s society, is inequality. On page 1 with the prompt and document examples, there are different pieces of evidence to back this claim up. The theme inequality in Cry The Beloved Country shows universality and its relation to the world through quotes from the novel and its relation to documents B, D, and E.
In 1930’s and 1940’s South Africa, many people suffered through traumatic events, whether it be a robbery, a loss of livelihood, a beating, or the ultimate tragedy, the loss of a loved one. In his novel Cry, the Beloved Country, Alan Paton makes sure that this is not left out of his true-to-life, albeit fictional, account of life in South Africa. James Jarvis is the recipient of this tragedy in the novel. His son, Arthur Jarvis, is murdered in his home by Absalom Kumalo during a botched robbery attempt. This sudden loss breaks Jarvis’ heart and sends him reeling. He goes to Johannesburg for the trial and ends up realizing that he really didn’t know his son at all. Reading his son’s writings causes him to have a moral conversion, and he begins his new life when he returns to Ndotsheni. Even though James Jarvis is a man of few words, he has much to say after his son’s death and he speaks through his actions.
Cry the Beloved Country, by Alan Paton, is the story of the two fictional characters, Stephen Kumalo and James Jarvis, who lose their sons in South Africa in 1948. In his story, Alan Paton used the George Hegel's Dialect of thesis, antithesis, synthesis, in order to expose social injustices in a microcosm of South Africa that correlate to the macrocosm of the issues faced by the entire country and what must be done to fix these injustices. Paton subdivided his story into three books. The first of these books, depicts the Journey of Stephen Kumalo, to try and restore his family, is a cry against injustice. The second book focused mainly on James Jarvis’s plight to understand his deceased son, depicts the yearning for justice. While the final book displays the restoration and repair of the injustices derived from the yearning for justice.
Rebecca West and Virginia Woolf give great significance to the families of their respective main characters in The Return of the Soldier and Jacob’s Room because it gives the reader a greater insight to the formation of and reasoning for both Chris and Jacob’s nature. Each of these characters have multiple families to deal with: Chris has Kitty and Jenny on the one hand, and Margaret on the other, while Jacob deals with his mother and brother as well as his connections to society and academia. The distinctions between each character’s multiple families cause them to behave differently in various situations, and provide reasons for their actions. It is said that we are shaped by our surroundings and molded by our families, and Woolf and West’s male protagonists prove to be no exception to this rule.
Bibliography w/4 sources Cry , the Beloved Country by Alan Paton is a perfect example of post-colonial literature. South Africa is a colonized country, which is, in many ways, still living under oppression. Though no longer living under apartheid, the indigenous Africans are treated as a minority, as they were when Paton wrote the book. This novel provides the political view of the author in both subtle and evident ways. Looking at the skeleton of the novel, it is extremely evident that relationship of the colonized vs. colonizers, in this case the blacks vs. the whites, rules the plot. Every character’s race is provided and has association with his/her place in life. A black man kills a white man, therefore that black man must die. A black umfundisi lives in a valley of desolation, while a white farmer dwells above on a rich plot of land. White men are even taken to court for the simple gesture of giving a black man a ride. This is not a subtle point, the reader is immediately stricken by the diversities in the lives of the South Africans.
When St. John is first introduced in the book, he finds Jane completely destitute with nowhere to go and no one to rely on for help. Despite her refusal to reveal her true identity, St. John takes Jane in to live with him and his two sisters, Diana and Mary. Once she has been nursed to health, St. John gives Jane a job as a school teacher at a girls school as well as a small cottage in which to live (339). At this point in the novel, word reaches the Rivers family of their Uncle's death. Unfortunately, another relative was favored for the large inheritance over them.
Hope is the strong feeling of desire for something good to happen. Hope is a driving force in the progression of life. The idea of hope is powerful because it can lead to patience, courage, and happiness. Hope is an important concept in Cry, the Beloved Country. Hope is what the main character Stephen Kumalo must use to keep fighting for his beliefs, for his son, and for his tribe. The power of hope is one of the only things that people had to overcome apartheid in South Africa. If hope were not present, Stephen Kumalo may have gave up on restoring himself, his son, and his tribe. Hope is the concept that helps Stephen Kumalo and other characters develop during the span of the novel. Hope is found in the characters, the tribe, and the land.
When John sees his dad at the store, his internal conflict develops and this leads to his conflict with Grace. People in relationships tend to get into arguments with each other. It is a very realistic representation of his character. It would be unrealistic if a couple never argues. He accuses her of being a snob and this leads to the argument which is revealed when the narrator says, “They had never talked in this way, and now they were both quickly eager to hurt each other” (4). This illustrates that they were growing as a couple and were opening up to each other about their feelings. John finally lets his inner anger out on Grace and shows that he cares about her opinion on different matters such as how she views people from lower social class (3). John is a hypocrite since he calls Grace a snob when in reality he, himself is a snob because he is embarrassed of his dad’s lower social status. He is assuming that Grace would not like to be associated with him after finding out the truth. This is shown when he asks Grace, “You don 't like the kind of people you bump into here, … he asks recklessly, full of a savage eagerness to hurt her” (3). He is being naive for forcing his anger on Grace and not realizing the reason that is causing it. People tend to make foolish decisions when they are angry; likewise, John is trying to hurt Grace because he thinks he
Stephen's relationship with the opposite sex begins to develop early in his life. Within the first few pages of the novel lie hints of the different roles women will...