Cry The Beloved Country
The book "Cry, the Beloved Country" by Alan Paton is a book about agitation and turmoil of both whites and blacks over the white segregation policy called apartheid. The book describes how understanding between whites and blacks can end mutual fear and aggresion, and bring reform and hope to a small community of Ndotcheni as well as to South Africa as a whole. The language of the book reflects the Bible; furthermore, several characters and episodes are reminiscent of stories from the New Testament and teachings of Christ. Thus, Alan Paton, as a reformer and the author of "Cry, the Beloved Country", gives the people of South Africa a new, modern Bible, where he, like Christ, teaches to ...
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thoughts "translated" from Zulu.
Jesus Christ is symbolized by the figure of Arthur Jarvis. He is a white reformer who fights for rights of blacks. Like Christ, he is very altruistic and wants to pursue his aims at all costs. His friend, Harrison, says: "Here [Arthur Jarvis] was, day to day, on a kind of mission." (173) Arthur Jarvis and his wife Mary "agree that it's more important to speak the truth than to make money." (172) Arthur Jarvis is killed in his house by Absalom, a black youth who gets entangled in crime. Absalom only intends to rob Arthur Jarvis, and the homicide is unintentional. Absalom thinks that Arthur Jarvis is out and comes into the house with two friends. However, when Arthur Jarvis "heard a noise, and came down to investigate" (186). Startled and afraid, Absalom fires blindly. Absalom later says in court: "Then a white man came into the passage… I was frightened. I fired the revolver." (194) Absalom's blind fear is symbolic of the fear, blindness, ...
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one another and sat on the long cool verandahs drinking their tea, they must needs look out over the barren valleys and the bare hills that were stretched below them. Some of their labor was drawn from Ndotcheni, and they knew how year by year there was less food grown in these reserves." (162)
Jarvis is not a bad person but is ignorant about the lives of blacks and the real issues that take place.
After the death of his son Jarvis learns to view blacks as real people. Jarvis reads his son's papers and suddenly becomes concerned with the ideas expressed by his son and by Abraham Lincoln. "Jarvis sat, deeply moved [after reading Arthur's last paper.] … [Then Jarvis] read ...
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Cry The Beloved Country. (2006, January 23). Retrieved November 23, 2024, from http://www.essayworld.com/essays/Cry-The-Beloved-Country/40086
"Cry The Beloved Country." Essayworld.com. Essayworld.com, 23 Jan. 2006. Web. 23 Nov. 2024. <http://www.essayworld.com/essays/Cry-The-Beloved-Country/40086>
"Cry The Beloved Country." Essayworld.com. January 23, 2006. Accessed November 23, 2024. http://www.essayworld.com/essays/Cry-The-Beloved-Country/40086.
"Cry The Beloved Country." Essayworld.com. January 23, 2006. Accessed November 23, 2024. http://www.essayworld.com/essays/Cry-The-Beloved-Country/40086.
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