Thus begins this novel of powerful themes. The novel explores how one’s country creates pain and gives comfort at the same time.
In its core, the novel talks about the struggle of an old Negro priest, Kumalo, who learns that his only son has committed the most horrible crime of all: taking another man’s life. The young man who was killed was the son of the rich white South African, James Jarvis, who is a quiet and agreeable man in the village of Ixopo. His son was an active and a well-respected reformist in the city of Johannesburg and he was accidentally killed by Kumalo’s son, who along with two other young men, intended only to steal from the white man’s house.
Kumalo travels to the city of Johannesburg where his son is being kept. The old priest is frightened by the busy city, and is extremely distressed about his son; and although the novel is about the boy, the story is not his.
This is largely the story of the father who raised him, who had held his little hand in the darkness when he was afraid, who had looked at him and envisioned so many wonderful things for them both, who had prayed for him all the goodness of the world.
Now, sitting across his son in the jail house of Johannesburg, Kumalo asks the boy, “Why?”, but the boy could only hang his head and weep. He was going to be hanged for his crime. Kumalo wonders what breaks in a man, at the moment that he strikes another man, with the same hand that had groped for his father’s hand in the darkness, afraid, when he was a little boy. This breaks Kumalo’s heart, and he finds no solace, even, momentarily, in his faith.
He is only comforted by the memory of the beautiful land of Ndotsheni:
“Now God be thanked that the name of a hill is such music, that the name of a river can heal. Aye, even the name of a river that runs no more.”
Even the title of the novel is an address to the land, this unfortunate land, which embraces a people who are fearful and broken. It is a land where the young are made to think that progress is only achieved through violence in the city and where the old are left in the mountains to remember their children, because they do not go back. It is a land where the color of the skin dictates one’s fate. The title of the novel is an address to the land, telling it to cry for the unborn generation who will inherit the fear and the hopelessness.
The conclusion of this story is one of surrender, as Kumalo walks up the mountain on the eve of the hanging of his son. He had gone there before, in two occasions of crisis, when he needed to commune with God in solitude. On the way up, he meets Jarvis, and in words that are neither condemning nor kind, the two fathers both remember the son who died by the hands of the other son. Jarvis, “after such deep hurt, had shown such deep compassion” and Kumalo has seen it. The old priest is assured that there is hope—for him and for the land that he loves.
As the sun rose on the day of the hanging, the father rose too, with a panic in his heart that he quelled with a prayer. Somewhere else was a son who was looking straight at the same sun, with the rope around his neck, the same panic in his heart and perhaps, the same prayer; and up there on the mountain, the father saw his beloved country and wondered when the land, like him, would start to heal.
Written by South
African author Alan Paton in 1948, Cry, the Beloved Country is set in Ndotsheni, South Africa,
a beautiful place tainted by the fear of a broken people. It is set during
the difficult time of a racial segregation, where the rich and powerful white
South African is frightened by the violence of the deprived black South
African.
Kumalo travels to the city of Johannesburg where his son is being kept. The old priest is frightened by the busy city, and is extremely distressed about his son; and although the novel is about the boy, the story is not his.
This is largely the story of the father who raised him, who had held his little hand in the darkness when he was afraid, who had looked at him and envisioned so many wonderful things for them both, who had prayed for him all the goodness of the world.
Now, sitting across his son in the jail house of Johannesburg, Kumalo asks the boy, “Why?”, but the boy could only hang his head and weep. He was going to be hanged for his crime. Kumalo wonders what breaks in a man, at the moment that he strikes another man, with the same hand that had groped for his father’s hand in the darkness, afraid, when he was a little boy. This breaks Kumalo’s heart, and he finds no solace, even, momentarily, in his faith.
He is only comforted by the memory of the beautiful land of Ndotsheni:
“Now God be thanked that the name of a hill is such music, that the name of a river can heal. Aye, even the name of a river that runs no more.”
Even the title of the novel is an address to the land, this unfortunate land, which embraces a people who are fearful and broken. It is a land where the young are made to think that progress is only achieved through violence in the city and where the old are left in the mountains to remember their children, because they do not go back. It is a land where the color of the skin dictates one’s fate. The title of the novel is an address to the land, telling it to cry for the unborn generation who will inherit the fear and the hopelessness.
The conclusion of this story is one of surrender, as Kumalo walks up the mountain on the eve of the hanging of his son. He had gone there before, in two occasions of crisis, when he needed to commune with God in solitude. On the way up, he meets Jarvis, and in words that are neither condemning nor kind, the two fathers both remember the son who died by the hands of the other son. Jarvis, “after such deep hurt, had shown such deep compassion” and Kumalo has seen it. The old priest is assured that there is hope—for him and for the land that he loves.
As the sun rose on the day of the hanging, the father rose too, with a panic in his heart that he quelled with a prayer. Somewhere else was a son who was looking straight at the same sun, with the rope around his neck, the same panic in his heart and perhaps, the same prayer; and up there on the mountain, the father saw his beloved country and wondered when the land, like him, would start to heal.
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