Shane Moran - Alternation Journal

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Arrived after you had returned honie Only to disappear Far more permanently: Between the posting and tile delivery, Your order to a newspaper For a liquid carpct cleaner On special offer Took on the weight of all the earth That covered you (52). authorial power as the poetic voices are invaded and appropriated by a theoret discourse. ************ Deafening Silence Cape Town: I-Iuman and Rousseau. 1997.300 pp. ISBN 0798137045 Reviewed by Thengani Ngwenya Department of English University of Durban-Westville 270 Iremation 5,1 (1998) 271-273 ISSN 1023.1757 271 t only been translated into English, but has also been serialised on television. This story which is presented in the form ofanovel is the story of Tumelo John Moleko s to create a convincing and comprehensive portrait of his main character by the growth and maturation of Tumelo from his childhood in the rural village of
inconsistencies which lie behind the ritualistic formality and orderlines force. Moleko's brutal murder is therefore partly attributable to his own failure to g tlie inhumanity and sheer callousness of his enemies--Afrikaners who held se positions in the South African police force. Moleko never realises, until it is too that one cannot expect to be treated with justice and fairness by an institution in w those values are hardly recognised. After reading the blurb of Miles' novel, my immediate reaction was that was just another story of a white man with powerwho ill-treats and, ulti~nately, mur a junior black colleague whom lie considered to be 'cheeky'. However, aft few of the book's short chapters, I realised that I was dealing with something d was iinpressed not only by Miles' attempts to re-create, as authelltically as Rook Rev~ew ni Ngvllenya ************ Moleko's ill-fated life, but also by the thoroughly fascinating and ingenious manner which the story is uan-ated. Written in the conventional metafictional mode, novel constantly reminds the reader of its process of construction as well as its This Day and Age status as 'history' and 'fiction'. The writer is acharacter in his own story which has piececl together from Moleko's lawyers, friends, relatives and colleagues. focus of the book's chapters falls, alternately, on Moleko's life-history and writer's atte~npts to weave together various aspects of Moleko's short life. Town: David Philip, 1992. 267 pp. in creating vignettes of Moleko the count~y boy, the enthus policeman, the family man devoted to his wife and son, and ofso~neone who is slo learning to distinguish between illusion and reality in the conundrum of South Afric politics of the 1980s. 'I'hus the research which went into the writing of the book skilfully integrated with the narrative of Moieko's life. The writer's relationship w University of Durban-Westville his character is both fascinating and curious, as exemplified in the following remarks the omniscietlt narrator: W~ere yesterday. that is [he happy days of Enlightenment. only the despotic power of the monarch had seerned to stand between 1E I'm to makc so~netliing out of all this. lie thought. then he and 1 will man and his Freedom to act O\Jicol I 992:2). llavc to be in it togctl~cr: the policeman and the writcr, the hlackmart and thc \?il~ite. cacli confineci to his own tcrrito~y. yet both caught up in the .ja\vs oia prcdatoty system k~hcrc only tile hlind have vision LX ti-ccdom of'~iiovc~neiit ... liis liisrory is 1114. story: liis stoiy, irly af'fliction (1 7). -li:xiuaI selflrcllexivity, authorial intervention and constant changes iri n of view arc not siluply a manifes~ation of Miles' fascination with postmodern nan-ative strategies, but a realistic demonstration of the difficulties faci attelnpts to paint a relatively well-rounded portrait of a Inan whose life- be gleaned from police records, lawyers' files and uncertain oral testimonies. First the lightning slashed at the earth when she ran until it struck alld Miles' book has ensured.that the sad fate of Richard Motasi she changed into a frog. Then the wind carne in a rush and caugllt ui, tlic name) will not be consigned to the dustbin of history as his murderers wanted it to frog blousing it higher and higher until it turned to dust (jVicol 1992: 130. hut will he read by ~niliions of readers world-wide. Thns a sto~y of a 'Mr wilt? paiict~vith his life in llis fight forjustice and personal vindication has become part Given these characteristics, Nicol's novel can also be categorised as a lnagic our litcrar!,-historical heritage. Although it may seem thal Dcqfknin,? Silen t text-a text that uses myth and legend in its constr~~ction to challenge earlier unnecessarily ilaunts its stylistic eclecticism as well as its status as a discursi of realism. Problems of categorisation inultiply when we consider that lnagic const~uct iike no st postmode~nist novels, perhaps these are the most el~l'ective narrati may denote a pal-ticular strain of the conte~nporaly movement covered by -- -- 272
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Glenn Hooper Armah, Ayi Kwei 1973.
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References I he Use o/ 1Vet.narllla
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Davicl Kazanlian deportat~on scheme
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David EiLzzcznjlaw Racial C;overrzn
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L)av~tl KCIZII~J~U~ Racial Cioverrz
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David Kusi~njian Spain's colonies i
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David Kczcilzanjicln calculably and
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Dovid Kcrzavrjzan Racial Governnzen
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David Kastrnjrnn white Americans ar
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Slanlo~i, I.,ucia C: 1993. 'Those W
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David Jol~nson De Misl, Race unrl N
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De Mzst, Race and Nation opposjlion
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De Mist, Race and Nutlon Whether th
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lived modernity, and as complex and
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C'zirrent Turrzds in the Production
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urrent lrends in the Prodzdction of
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LI(IIEPZI ~reilus zn the Prodzlcllo
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Alex la Guma's Politics and Aesthet
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Alex In Gzlrna i Polltics and Aesth
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Alex la Gums k Politics and Aesthet
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Shane Moran - Alternation Journal

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