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My Sons Story
Playing truant, Will slips off to a movie theatre near Johannesburg and is shocked to see his father there--with a woman he doesn't know. The father is a "colored" schoolteacher who has become a hero in the struggle against apartheid; his companion is a white activist fiercely dedicated to the cause.
Hardcover
First published January 1, 1990
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1925 people want to read
About the author
Nadine Gordimer
332 books955 followersNadine Gordimer was a South African writer, political activist, and recipient of the 1991 Nobel Prize in Literature. She was recognized as a woman "who through her magnificent epic writing has – in the words of Alfred Nobel – been of very great benefit to humanity".
Gordimer's writing dealt with moral and racial issues, particularly apartheid in South Africa. Under that regime, works such as Burger's Daughter and July's People were banned. She was active in the anti-apartheid movement, joining the African National Congress during the days when the organization was banned. She was also active in HIV/AIDS causes.
Gordimer's writing dealt with moral and racial issues, particularly apartheid in South Africa. Under that regime, works such as Burger's Daughter and July's People were banned. She was active in the anti-apartheid movement, joining the African National Congress during the days when the organization was banned. She was also active in HIV/AIDS causes.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 155 reviews
November 21, 2025
We are constantly under tension in this novel. Up close, the dislocation of the family, undermined by adultery, lies, and concealment, is the ambiguous relationship between a son and his father. And in the background, the History which advances with great strides towards the end of apartheid, the political engagements of which one does not discern anymore the true motive, and the hopes which already tarnish.
September 15, 2014
Will, playing truant, bumps into his father with a white woman at a movie theater. A narrative unfolds of reflections enmeshed with aggressive personal bitterness and the political upheaval of the times in South Africa. Nadine Gordimer’s 'My Son’s Story' becomes the story of the son, the father, the mother, and the father’s woman: embedded in the interplay of race, gender, politics, family, love and commitment.
‘It was because of them whose pigments darkened the blood, procreated a murky dilution in the veins of the white town, disowned by the white town..’
The black and the real black; what it is to have something of the white man in the veins. It is not the same, of course. It cannot be grasped together in one sweeping gesture of the arm. The segregation exists not only from the white people, but also in the sense of a community based on ‘blackness’ and ‘real blackness’.
‘Better to keep them at distance and not recognize any feature in them.'
The act of segregation and how the family defies the suggestion, even though it means comprehending their abode as a symbol of ghettoizing, of indignity, of degradation. The personal is sacrificed for the public, for an idea and a principle.
‘The trouble was, he didn’t feel himself inferior – inferior to what, to whom?’
‘Freedom’ isn’t the same as ‘Equality’. Equality is often processed into something finer called freedom. Being free doesn’t mean an aspiration for equality which often reeks of envy for the one who is superior. To become like those you have always hated and feared. Who wants that? Until and unless that sense of inferiority has been sufficiently internalized with a pejorative sense of one’s self and identity.
‘..if she gave Sonny everything else of herself, it would have been worth less if she had not kept to herself some fiber of personality as a separate identity’
A marriage shared with an intuitive sense of togetherness, an understanding which is instinctive, and with a complicity of responses, suffers from a distancing that happens with one disjointed experience followed by aloofness, silent pain and withdrawal. Aila becomes a silent steadfast presence throughout the novel.
The commitment to the community, the acts of making it right for the others often invade the spaces of personal, family relations, and there is a feeling of usurpation of the ‘evenings’, the ‘picnics’, the ‘Saturdays’ spent together in the ‘grayness’ of the city. And the latitude one gains with such elevation in the domain of the public, in reshaping the personal, mixing up its components here and there, disordered and sometimes unattended. -- ‘..not to be followed in his private thoughts by ordinary people. Like herself. Like us’.
‘But he knows I can’t speak – to my mother; I can’t refuse to be in the know, with him.’
The act of performing, the slyness, and the difference that can be smelled. And the misery at such a discovery, the ‘privilege’ of stumbling upon the darkness, the secret, and the change that comes with it, as the slow seething poison that gushes in to corrupt the sanctity of long held faith and love shared.The tiny guarded morsels of autonomy one is fed with to keep the darkness to some closed quarters of the conscience. And the bitterness at the thought of how the sense of guilt melted only to congeal and harden as wax over the disordered, dysfunctional lives.
‘Oh Aila, Aila. Why did Aila never speak?'
There is in Sonny a need for a certain kind of vocabulary. There is the vocabulary of tranquil love, of family matters, comfortable silences, which is so attuned to the language of the shared years that catching on, learning and unlearning as per the demands the situation becomes difficult; Aila is the slow learner. And the other one of politics; redundant, abstruse, exciting. And the attraction that brews for a woman who crosses the political spheres to comfort, console, reassure and get entangled with the personal. Needing Hannah. The inescapable, always.
Aila has never been granted subjectivity throughout the course of the story. She is always the silent presence. The son incessantly speaks of his mother but always as the nurturer who has been wronged by his father, thus bringing destruction to their home. The more Sonny recedes into Hannah, the more Aila comes out of this objectified patriarchal notion of motherhood and femininity. The cutting of her hair is disapproved by her son as a symbolic bowdlerization of the graceful womanhood that he always associates with his mother.
‘She never came back, cut loose. She was gone for good: my mother’
But even this lack of subjectivity becomes purposeful in Gordimer’s representation of the revolutionary potential of a quiet, ordinary, unassertive woman who has now attained convictions and determination of her own in a political, personal and narrative space largely dominated by patriarchal prejudices and activity.
‘It was because of them whose pigments darkened the blood, procreated a murky dilution in the veins of the white town, disowned by the white town..’
The black and the real black; what it is to have something of the white man in the veins. It is not the same, of course. It cannot be grasped together in one sweeping gesture of the arm. The segregation exists not only from the white people, but also in the sense of a community based on ‘blackness’ and ‘real blackness’.
‘Better to keep them at distance and not recognize any feature in them.'
The act of segregation and how the family defies the suggestion, even though it means comprehending their abode as a symbol of ghettoizing, of indignity, of degradation. The personal is sacrificed for the public, for an idea and a principle.
‘The trouble was, he didn’t feel himself inferior – inferior to what, to whom?’
‘Freedom’ isn’t the same as ‘Equality’. Equality is often processed into something finer called freedom. Being free doesn’t mean an aspiration for equality which often reeks of envy for the one who is superior. To become like those you have always hated and feared. Who wants that? Until and unless that sense of inferiority has been sufficiently internalized with a pejorative sense of one’s self and identity.
‘..if she gave Sonny everything else of herself, it would have been worth less if she had not kept to herself some fiber of personality as a separate identity’
A marriage shared with an intuitive sense of togetherness, an understanding which is instinctive, and with a complicity of responses, suffers from a distancing that happens with one disjointed experience followed by aloofness, silent pain and withdrawal. Aila becomes a silent steadfast presence throughout the novel.
The commitment to the community, the acts of making it right for the others often invade the spaces of personal, family relations, and there is a feeling of usurpation of the ‘evenings’, the ‘picnics’, the ‘Saturdays’ spent together in the ‘grayness’ of the city. And the latitude one gains with such elevation in the domain of the public, in reshaping the personal, mixing up its components here and there, disordered and sometimes unattended. -- ‘..not to be followed in his private thoughts by ordinary people. Like herself. Like us’.
‘But he knows I can’t speak – to my mother; I can’t refuse to be in the know, with him.’
The act of performing, the slyness, and the difference that can be smelled. And the misery at such a discovery, the ‘privilege’ of stumbling upon the darkness, the secret, and the change that comes with it, as the slow seething poison that gushes in to corrupt the sanctity of long held faith and love shared.The tiny guarded morsels of autonomy one is fed with to keep the darkness to some closed quarters of the conscience. And the bitterness at the thought of how the sense of guilt melted only to congeal and harden as wax over the disordered, dysfunctional lives.
‘Oh Aila, Aila. Why did Aila never speak?'
There is in Sonny a need for a certain kind of vocabulary. There is the vocabulary of tranquil love, of family matters, comfortable silences, which is so attuned to the language of the shared years that catching on, learning and unlearning as per the demands the situation becomes difficult; Aila is the slow learner. And the other one of politics; redundant, abstruse, exciting. And the attraction that brews for a woman who crosses the political spheres to comfort, console, reassure and get entangled with the personal. Needing Hannah. The inescapable, always.
Aila has never been granted subjectivity throughout the course of the story. She is always the silent presence. The son incessantly speaks of his mother but always as the nurturer who has been wronged by his father, thus bringing destruction to their home. The more Sonny recedes into Hannah, the more Aila comes out of this objectified patriarchal notion of motherhood and femininity. The cutting of her hair is disapproved by her son as a symbolic bowdlerization of the graceful womanhood that he always associates with his mother.
‘She never came back, cut loose. She was gone for good: my mother’
But even this lack of subjectivity becomes purposeful in Gordimer’s representation of the revolutionary potential of a quiet, ordinary, unassertive woman who has now attained convictions and determination of her own in a political, personal and narrative space largely dominated by patriarchal prejudices and activity.
October 16, 2020
ترجمه فوق العاده بد،ويراستاري افتضاح و پر از غلط املايي و نگارشي!
December 4, 2008
Another wonderful book by Gordimer, I thought this was a seamlessly written gem. Again Gordimer tells a riveting story, creates fully drawn characters, brilliantly uses interior monologue and descriptive writing, and at the same time inserts the insideousness of racism and the scars of apartheid between every line.
Readers feel what it was like for blacks living in racist South Africa, and also an insightful look at the evolution of a marriage, a love affair, a father-son relationship and a young man's coming of age.
Readers feel what it was like for blacks living in racist South Africa, and also an insightful look at the evolution of a marriage, a love affair, a father-son relationship and a young man's coming of age.
May 31, 2009
There is wisdom in this book, per usual for Gordimer. She understands family and revolution. But I tired of Will's ferocity towards his cheating father, and the father's fierce attachment to his lover. Maybe another time.
May 26, 2021
A história que este livro conta é importante, visto tratar da vida de uma família que vive durante o apartheid e sofre a sua desagregação devido a questões associadas. Através daquilo que me parecem monólogos interiores, ficamos a conhecer o casal Sonny e Aila, cujo relacionamento é estreito e baseado em respeito e admiração mútuas. Têm 2 filhos, Baby e Will. Ele era professor, mas foi afastado por ter participado em protestos em prol da comunidade. Envolve-se mais nos protestos contra o apartheid e é preso. Ficamos a saber os efeitos sobre a família. No entanto, um dia, é visto pelo filho num cinema com a sua amante branca, Hannah, uma das ativistas da causa. Will põe tudo o que conhece em causa por causa desse encontro. Analisa a repugnância que aquela mulher branca lhe causa e que se justifica pela sua cor, mas também por ter destruído o seu mundo, apesar de o pai e a mãe se comportarem da mesma forma. Baby acaba por aderir à causa, sai do país e vai continuar a vida na Zâmbia. Sonny não tem direito a passaporte. Aila visita a filha e conhece a neta. Um dia, Aila é presa: encontram armas na garagem. Aqui, é a última prova sofrida por esta família, num ambiente tenso de segregação racial. A opressão, a injustiça e as regras são transmitidas claramente. No entanto, a leitura foi lenta e penosa devido à grande quantidade de pensamentos políticos e metafísicos que tornava a leitura cansativa. A mancha gráfica muito cerrada também não ajudou a leitura. As ideias são importantes, a construção da narrativa é interessante, mas monótona.
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March 21, 2024این چه ویراستاری و ترجمهی فاجعهای بود؟ چرا اینهمه ایراد و غلط؟ آن قدر عجیب بود برای من که رفتم و سری زدم به کتاب دیگری که ترجمهی این مترجم باشد با نشر و ویراستاری متفاوت: «دلبند» تونی موریسون چاپ چشمه. این یکی هم بد بود. البته میدانم موریسون در کل هم نثر سختی دارد، اما ایرادها بعضاً غیرقابل اغماض هستند. مقداری حالم گرفته شده. باید سراغ ترجمهای دیگر یا متن اصلی بروم.
February 23, 2019
Irkçılık, ten renginden insan ayrımı, toplumsal kaos ve bir aşk. Sonny'nin hikayesi çok etkileyici. Özellikle siyahi insanların yaşadıkları negatif ayrımcılığı okumayı sevenlere tavsiye ederim. Nobel'li yazarımız çok iyi bir iş çıkartmış. Siyahilerin gözünden olaylara bakıyor olmamız da farklı bir tat vermiş.
Akıcı, sürükleyici ve duygusal bir hikaye.
Akıcı, sürükleyici ve duygusal bir hikaye.
December 11, 2022
En mi interés, por ampliar mi conocimiento sobre escritores ganadores del premio nobel, llegué a este libro que saque de la biblioteca. La historia es sobre una familia en el periodo de lucha en contra del apartheid en Sudáfrica. Ese es el contexto y vemos a esta familiar principalmente desde la mirada del hijo que habla en primera persona, mezclada por un narrador en tercera persona. Me costó entrar un poco, no entendía por qué esta familia de clase media negra, muy limitada de recursos, pero con educación, se plantea como distintos a los otros negros. Desde así inicia y nos va mostrando los cambios desde una familia ideal y feliz; y como a partir de determinados hechos comienza una degradación. Este libro habla de lucha y de discriminación, pero no es en absoluto un panfleto o una historia ejemplar o de héroes o víctimas. La voz narrativa se centra en el amor, el engaño, las mentiras y desilusión y sobre todo de las complejas relaciones familiares. Me gustó mucho.
June 9, 2019
First off, I*need* to state this: I am so happy to have had the good fortune to pick up this book. For those of my friends who have heard of Blossoms bookshop, this is yet another reason why it’s just SO awesome! :)
Second, please do not read the section between the ***spoiler*** marks unless:
a) You’ve already read this book (or)
b) You’re not planning to read this book
Now, about the book itself, what struck me the most is the sheer *intelligence* of the writer. Nadine Gordimer knows how to manipulate the minds of her readers and hold them captive in the world she paints around her characters.
The theme of this book seems commonplace enough – an extra-marital affair that gets found out. But the backdrop against which it’s set (race tensions and uprisings for equality), combined with very complex characters, makes it anything but commonplace.
Sonny, initially a school-teacher by profession is married to Aila, and has two children: Baby and Will. Will, aged fifteen at the start of the story, stumbles upon Sonny’s affair with Hannah, a white woman. This forms the starting point, and the basis for the entire novel.
I found I could naturally relate to the turmoil of this adolescent’s mind; introspecting so much, obsessing so much. He often sinks into negativity, thinking through every aspect of his father’s affair. Something that not only shattered his ideal of what he thought his parents’ lives were, but also made him agonize over the details of his father’s secret life. The inner workings of his father’s mind: how he felt about his “other woman” as well as how he thought about his wife now. Whether he felt shame, guilt, anything, nothing. A boy with his heart broken. Broken by the man he looked up to throughout his life up until then. The man who’d set such high ideals for his own self as well as his family.
The format of the book is an alternating narrative: one from the point of view of Will, the son, and the other being Sonny’s (his father’s) side of the story. The two facets seem to form a continuity – fitting like the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle.
***Spoiler start***
The two sides of the same story are related with a great deal of (seeming) honesty, from differing character’s points of view. This lulls you into believing that what you read *IS* in fact a collage of two people stitching together a story. Until the very end, that is.
That’s when you realise, your very premise is wrong. And then you realise, that all this while, you had assumed both voices to be present in the narration. Sometimes even three voices; Hannah’s story comes through occasionally, although the dominant voices are those of the father and son.
The revelation that this premise is wrong is unsettling, to say the least. The entire story is narrated by one mind, Will’s. But that mind, while narrating Sonny’s story is a different one from that of the isolated teenager’s you see initially to be Will’s. It is Will putting himself in his father’s shoes. Telling Sonny’s story with an empathy that only his son is capable of. Will, in a different stage of life.
This revelation is also honest in its caveats. You are warned (at the very last page of the book) that there might have been places where Will’s own judgements might have spilled over to what were supposed to be others’ stories.
It draws a thick screen of haze over the entire narrative you’ve just read. Leaves you questioning how much of what you’ve read is an unbiased account. How much is portrayed “as it really was”. It leaves all character outlines blurred..
***Spoiler end***
More about Gordimer’s writing: What other writers take pages to convey through extensive description, she does in a single sentence or in a couple of sentences. But equally, in order to process such complicated thought processes in very unorthodox sentence-construction, it takes immense concentration and ever re-reading of a sentence multiple times.
You really need to lose yourself in this book, emote with the characters, to grasp what Gordimer is conveying at each moment. She doesn’t waste words to ensure her reader is “with her” at every point. It is up to the reader to empathize, and thus comprehend her prose, economical in its usage of words.
Another feature which needs some getting used to is the excessive use of hyphens. Almost every paragraph has one sentence strewn with hyphens, unpredictable lengths of sentences separated by them.
While reading some reviews of this book (before I picked it up), I came across a few whose opinions were very different from my own (during and after reading the book myself). I do agree with one reviewer who pointed out the repeated usage of the “needing Hannah” device. I too felt, as I was progressing through the book that the phrase “needing Hannah” was used too often to remain poignant. But given the richness of the rest of the book, this seems like a trifling complaint.
However, I certainly did not get impatient with the boy’s obsession and fretting about his father’s affair. It was only too natural, and formed the very foundation for the story. That kind of a complaint from a reader would make this book an unsuitable choice for them.
Second, please do not read the section between the ***spoiler*** marks unless:
a) You’ve already read this book (or)
b) You’re not planning to read this book
Now, about the book itself, what struck me the most is the sheer *intelligence* of the writer. Nadine Gordimer knows how to manipulate the minds of her readers and hold them captive in the world she paints around her characters.
The theme of this book seems commonplace enough – an extra-marital affair that gets found out. But the backdrop against which it’s set (race tensions and uprisings for equality), combined with very complex characters, makes it anything but commonplace.
Sonny, initially a school-teacher by profession is married to Aila, and has two children: Baby and Will. Will, aged fifteen at the start of the story, stumbles upon Sonny’s affair with Hannah, a white woman. This forms the starting point, and the basis for the entire novel.
I found I could naturally relate to the turmoil of this adolescent’s mind; introspecting so much, obsessing so much. He often sinks into negativity, thinking through every aspect of his father’s affair. Something that not only shattered his ideal of what he thought his parents’ lives were, but also made him agonize over the details of his father’s secret life. The inner workings of his father’s mind: how he felt about his “other woman” as well as how he thought about his wife now. Whether he felt shame, guilt, anything, nothing. A boy with his heart broken. Broken by the man he looked up to throughout his life up until then. The man who’d set such high ideals for his own self as well as his family.
The format of the book is an alternating narrative: one from the point of view of Will, the son, and the other being Sonny’s (his father’s) side of the story. The two facets seem to form a continuity – fitting like the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle.
***Spoiler start***
The two sides of the same story are related with a great deal of (seeming) honesty, from differing character’s points of view. This lulls you into believing that what you read *IS* in fact a collage of two people stitching together a story. Until the very end, that is.
That’s when you realise, your very premise is wrong. And then you realise, that all this while, you had assumed both voices to be present in the narration. Sometimes even three voices; Hannah’s story comes through occasionally, although the dominant voices are those of the father and son.
The revelation that this premise is wrong is unsettling, to say the least. The entire story is narrated by one mind, Will’s. But that mind, while narrating Sonny’s story is a different one from that of the isolated teenager’s you see initially to be Will’s. It is Will putting himself in his father’s shoes. Telling Sonny’s story with an empathy that only his son is capable of. Will, in a different stage of life.
This revelation is also honest in its caveats. You are warned (at the very last page of the book) that there might have been places where Will’s own judgements might have spilled over to what were supposed to be others’ stories.
It draws a thick screen of haze over the entire narrative you’ve just read. Leaves you questioning how much of what you’ve read is an unbiased account. How much is portrayed “as it really was”. It leaves all character outlines blurred..
***Spoiler end***
More about Gordimer’s writing: What other writers take pages to convey through extensive description, she does in a single sentence or in a couple of sentences. But equally, in order to process such complicated thought processes in very unorthodox sentence-construction, it takes immense concentration and ever re-reading of a sentence multiple times.
You really need to lose yourself in this book, emote with the characters, to grasp what Gordimer is conveying at each moment. She doesn’t waste words to ensure her reader is “with her” at every point. It is up to the reader to empathize, and thus comprehend her prose, economical in its usage of words.
Another feature which needs some getting used to is the excessive use of hyphens. Almost every paragraph has one sentence strewn with hyphens, unpredictable lengths of sentences separated by them.
While reading some reviews of this book (before I picked it up), I came across a few whose opinions were very different from my own (during and after reading the book myself). I do agree with one reviewer who pointed out the repeated usage of the “needing Hannah” device. I too felt, as I was progressing through the book that the phrase “needing Hannah” was used too often to remain poignant. But given the richness of the rest of the book, this seems like a trifling complaint.
However, I certainly did not get impatient with the boy’s obsession and fretting about his father’s affair. It was only too natural, and formed the very foundation for the story. That kind of a complaint from a reader would make this book an unsuitable choice for them.
September 12, 2019
نادین گوردیمر نویسنده اهل افریقای جنوبی، «داستان پسرم» را سال ۱۹۹۰ منتشر کرد و درست یک سال بعدش برنده نوبل شد و در بیانیه آکادمی نوبل مشخصا به این رمان اشاره شده بود.
موضوع رمان مبارزه با آپارتاید است و البته ماجرایی خانوادگی در کنارش. شخصیت اصلی داستان پسر یکی از رهبران کنگره ملی افریقای جنوبی است که ماجراهای خانواده را روایت میکند. من کتاب را حدود بیست سال پیش خواندم و یادم است که آن موقع خیلی دوستش داشتم. خواندن کتاب باعث شد تصویری از زندگی تحت سلطه آپارتاید و همینطور مبارزات مردم و سازمانهای مبارز پیدا کنم. ضمن اینکه اصلا اینطور نیست که مبارزان قهرمان مطلق باشند و سفیدها شر مطلق. گوردیمر هم خودش سفیدپوست بوده و هم از دوستان رهبران کنگره ملی از جمله خود ماندلا بوده، در نتیجه تصویری که داده نسبتا جامع است.
کتاب یک بار در سال ۷۳ منتشر شد و بعد از آن دیگر مجوز نمیگرفت و در بازار نبود. حالا بعد از حدود ۲۵ سال تجدیدچاپ شده و به گفته شهلا لایهیچی، ناشر کتاب: «۲۴ سال پیش یکبار این رمان را چاپ کردیم و بعد از آن دیگر اجازهی انتشار نگرفت تا اینکه امسال با کمی کنار آمدنِ ما با ارشاد و کمی کنار آمدنِ ارشاد با ما، توانستیم دوباره آن را چاپ کنیم.»
البته متاسفانه چاپ جدید کتاب حروفچینی و چاپ چندان خوبی ندارد.
موضوع رمان مبارزه با آپارتاید است و البته ماجرایی خانوادگی در کنارش. شخصیت اصلی داستان پسر یکی از رهبران کنگره ملی افریقای جنوبی است که ماجراهای خانواده را روایت میکند. من کتاب را حدود بیست سال پیش خواندم و یادم است که آن موقع خیلی دوستش داشتم. خواندن کتاب باعث شد تصویری از زندگی تحت سلطه آپارتاید و همینطور مبارزات مردم و سازمانهای مبارز پیدا کنم. ضمن اینکه اصلا اینطور نیست که مبارزان قهرمان مطلق باشند و سفیدها شر مطلق. گوردیمر هم خودش سفیدپوست بوده و هم از دوستان رهبران کنگره ملی از جمله خود ماندلا بوده، در نتیجه تصویری که داده نسبتا جامع است.
کتاب یک بار در سال ۷۳ منتشر شد و بعد از آن دیگر مجوز نمیگرفت و در بازار نبود. حالا بعد از حدود ۲۵ سال تجدیدچاپ شده و به گفته شهلا لایهیچی، ناشر کتاب: «۲۴ سال پیش یکبار این رمان را چاپ کردیم و بعد از آن دیگر اجازهی انتشار نگرفت تا اینکه امسال با کمی کنار آمدنِ ما با ارشاد و کمی کنار آمدنِ ارشاد با ما، توانستیم دوباره آن را چاپ کنیم.»
البته متاسفانه چاپ جدید کتاب حروفچینی و چاپ چندان خوبی ندارد.
November 14, 2024
Letto in occasione del gruppo di lettura della mia città, ho fatto veramente molta fatica ad avanzare. Il romanzo è molto denso, la scrittura complicata e talvolta è difficile capire il punto di vista: chi sta parlando? Il figlio deluso dal padre? Il padre attraverso gli occhi del figlio arrabbiato?
Sicuramente, il ritmo giova dell'astio che il piccolo Will prova per il genitore, Sonny, creando un vortice di rabbia repressa palpabile.
Per il resto, è un libro che ha bisogno di tempo e di alcune informazioni storiche imprenscindibili per comprendere al meglio le scelte e riflessioni di tutti i personaggi.
Sicuramente, il ritmo giova dell'astio che il piccolo Will prova per il genitore, Sonny, creando un vortice di rabbia repressa palpabile.
Per il resto, è un libro che ha bisogno di tempo e di alcune informazioni storiche imprenscindibili per comprendere al meglio le scelte e riflessioni di tutti i personaggi.
December 3, 2020
Over de strijd tegen apartheid
April 17, 2016
Full review at Smoke & Mirrors: http://books-n-music.blogspot.com/201.... Okay, finally done! I get it. I get the nuances, etc., of this narrative. However, Gordimer's writing style did not endear her to me as an author. However, with that said, I would like to read her Booker prize-winning novel, The Conservationist. This woman was awarded the Nobel in 1991. A white woman, she fought Apartheid, was raised and lived her life in South Africa, so I feel she is genuinely steeped in the culture and able to accurately reflect it's political inadequacies and prejudices and discriminatory laws and behaviors. She didn't just "study" (I'm thinking of Laughing Boy's author Oliver La Farge.) a society/culture, she was a living and breathing person within it. It appears that many of her novels deal with adulterous affairs. I realize this is just my own prejudice, but having been betrayed by a spouse, I don't believe love is only discovered through extramarital affairs. If you aren't going to be faithful within a monogamous relationship, don't vow to do so. It is a choice! (Stepping down from my soapbox now...)
One of the things I most appreciated about this specific book is Will's character and voice. It felt so sincere and bereft at being "left out" of the resistance, being expected to always "be there" to keep the "home fires burning," so to speak. This was a very interesting read about Apartheid. I just wish I had resonated better with Gordimer's writing style! I can certainly respect and admire her commitment and energies spent to fight Apartheid and her willingness to write and publish what were such controversial/"subversive" works in South Africa at the time. I feel as if I have a much better understanding of this time period and place in history from a black family's perspective and that's a good thing!!
One of the things I most appreciated about this specific book is Will's character and voice. It felt so sincere and bereft at being "left out" of the resistance, being expected to always "be there" to keep the "home fires burning," so to speak. This was a very interesting read about Apartheid. I just wish I had resonated better with Gordimer's writing style! I can certainly respect and admire her commitment and energies spent to fight Apartheid and her willingness to write and publish what were such controversial/"subversive" works in South Africa at the time. I feel as if I have a much better understanding of this time period and place in history from a black family's perspective and that's a good thing!!
December 24, 2021
Η Ναντίν Γκόρντιμερ σε όλη της την ζωή καταδίκαζε το Απαρτχάιντ και τον ρατσιμό εναντίον των έγχρωμων πολιτών στη Νότιο Αφρική. Το 1991 έλαβε το βραβείο Νομπέλ λογοτεχνίας για το έργο της.
Σε αυτό το βιβλίο της μας διηγείται την ιστορία μιας οικογένειας στο Γιοχάνεσμπουργκ. Ο πατέρας είναι δάσκαλος, ένας ήπιος μορφωμένος άνθρωπος, η μητέρα μια ειρηνική χαμογελαστή νοικοκυρά και υπάρχουν και δυο αγαπημένα παιδιά. Όλα βαίνουν καλώς έως τη στιγμη που ο πατέρας αποφασίζει να ενταχθεί στο κίνημα των αντιφρονούντων και να βοηθήσει τον λαό του για δικαιοσύνη. Φυλακίζεται και απομακρύνεται από την οικογένειά του από την κυβέρνηση του Απαρτχάιντ. Και εκεί κάπου γνωρίζει μια ξανθιά λευκή ακτιβίστρια, η οποία βοηθάει το κίνημα των έγχρωμων και συνάπτει δεσμό μαζί της.
Από την μία υπάρχει όλη αυτή η εποχή με τις πολιτικές της ιδιαιτερότητες και από την άλλη ο γιος της οικογένειας προσπαθεί να συμβιβαστεί με την ιδέα της απιστίας του πατέρα του, και μάλιστα με μια λευκή.
Η Ναντίν Γκόρντιμερ ψυχογραφεί με υπέροχο τρόπο όλους τους ήρωες της και δεν μένει μόνο στην πολιτική διάσταση των γεγονότων αλλά και στην ανθρώπινη. Όπως άλλωστε λέει και η ίδια: η ιστορία του κάθε ανθρώπου είναι διαφορετική και η διήγησή της είναι αυτό που κάνει τελικά όμορφη τη λογοτεχνία.
Σε αυτό το βιβλίο της μας διηγείται την ιστορία μιας οικογένειας στο Γιοχάνεσμπουργκ. Ο πατέρας είναι δάσκαλος, ένας ήπιος μορφωμένος άνθρωπος, η μητέρα μια ειρηνική χαμογελαστή νοικοκυρά και υπάρχουν και δυο αγαπημένα παιδιά. Όλα βαίνουν καλώς έως τη στιγμη που ο πατέρας αποφασίζει να ενταχθεί στο κίνημα των αντιφρονούντων και να βοηθήσει τον λαό του για δικαιοσύνη. Φυλακίζεται και απομακρύνεται από την οικογένειά του από την κυβέρνηση του Απαρτχάιντ. Και εκεί κάπου γνωρίζει μια ξανθιά λευκή ακτιβίστρια, η οποία βοηθάει το κίνημα των έγχρωμων και συνάπτει δεσμό μαζί της.
Από την μία υπάρχει όλη αυτή η εποχή με τις πολιτικές της ιδιαιτερότητες και από την άλλη ο γιος της οικογένειας προσπαθεί να συμβιβαστεί με την ιδέα της απιστίας του πατέρα του, και μάλιστα με μια λευκή.
Η Ναντίν Γκόρντιμερ ψυχογραφεί με υπέροχο τρόπο όλους τους ήρωες της και δεν μένει μόνο στην πολιτική διάσταση των γεγονότων αλλά και στην ανθρώπινη. Όπως άλλωστε λέει και η ίδια: η ιστορία του κάθε ανθρώπου είναι διαφορετική και η διήγησή της είναι αυτό που κάνει τελικά όμορφη τη λογοτεχνία.
May 8, 2024
An interesting, slow read, about a coloured family in South Africa in the 1980s, before the end of apartheid. The husband, Sonny, is involved in a political group pushing for the end of apartheid. His wife, Aila, is the supportive housewife. Their son, the narrator, is at college doing business studies. Their daughter, ‘Baby’ has left South Africa, living in a nearby country where she is in a revolutionary group fighting against apartheid. Sonny is in a secret relationship with a white woman, Hannah.
Sonny used to be a teacher, but now works solely for the underground political action group. He is good with words and one of the leaders of the group. He has been imprisoned by the government for his political activities.
The roles of the family members change over time due to certain events. Plot momentum picks up in the last third of the novel. A worthwhile, thought provoking, satisfying read.
This book was first published in 1990.
Sonny used to be a teacher, but now works solely for the underground political action group. He is good with words and one of the leaders of the group. He has been imprisoned by the government for his political activities.
The roles of the family members change over time due to certain events. Plot momentum picks up in the last third of the novel. A worthwhile, thought provoking, satisfying read.
This book was first published in 1990.
November 9, 2025
This was a bit of a difficult read for me. It felt slow and somehow lackluster and I definitely needed a bit of an explanation and a push in order to continue reading. The additional information, all the spoilers and dissection of the novel from the professor actually helped me a lot with having a better understanding of the events in the book, as well as why it felt so choppy and difficult. I found the tension throughout the book quite intense at times and some of the imagery was very vivid, it stayed with me even after finishing the novel. I understand why Gordimer is held in such high regard in South Africa - this was a very interesting exploration of the complex and dangerous racial politics in South Africa, but more than that, it was an important exploration of human nature, belonging and choices.
November 10, 2018
3.5 stars
January 10, 2021
Remarkable, stunning, deeply moving. This book packs in all the heartbreak and hope of South Africa as it neared the end of apartheid, and shows it from such a deeply personal perspective that you really 'know' what it would be like to live on the margins of society and the terrible choices you'd have to make. This book will stick with me forever.
I realize that there are books about apartheid -- fiction, memoir and history -- that deal with the issues more bluntly and with more terror and sadness. I get it that this book is only one slice of what life would have been like in the 1970s and 1980s. But it's so compellingly real and so remarkably astute about how we come to crossroads decisions in our lives that I feel as if lived it myself. (Lived it from my comfortable US suburbia.)
The story is told by a young man, Will, about his parents' relationship, his father's long affair, and the coming of age of Will and his sister 'Baby'. All of it is set against the forces of apartheid and the ways that it particularly affects his 'colored' class family. For a while, they settle reasonably comfortably and take pride in their status and contribution to society. But just as the racist illogic of apartheid was untenable, so too are the lies you must tell yourself and the limitations you are told to accept. You can either allow it to kill you (metaphorically), or you can fight it even if it means you might be killed (for real).
Will's parents are 'colored,' rather than 'black.' This gives them privileges unavailable to the larger population of descendants of the Africans who lived there for millennia. Will's father, Sonny, is a brilliant teacher, who loves Shakespeare (thus the name Will for his son), and becomes a school teacher, an achievement that fills his villager relatives with pride. Sonny's family lives on the outskirts of Johannesburg, in an area reserved for coloreds, in a shack that passed for standard housing in the area. Sonny's wife Aila is beautiful, regal, quiet and reserved. Both she and Sonny prioritize dignity, particularly given the limits placed on their lives. They always look great, talk properly, and do the right thing. They are respected in their colored community as people to whom others can turn to for advice and help -- achingly, in conditions such as women who come to Sonny to ask him to get their husbands to stop beating them.
At some point, however, Sonny decides to support his students when they want to protest against bad conditions they face. His ability to speak to the students and also to an assembly brings him greater renown within the community. And this brings him to the attention of groups that are protesting apartheid. At this time, these groups are basically outlawed, with only the most benign types of requests allowed. Sonny had been content to be on the mild side, such as asking White members of social clubs to donate old clothes and books for colored kids.
But he gradually becomes radicalized and becomes a quiet, respected leader of the opposition. He's fired as a schoolteacher, and he goes to more and more clandestine meetings. Eventually, he's arrested, convicted, and held in jail for about two years. He comes out a changed man, harder in his commitment and distanced from his family. He's still the same Sonny, but a different side of him has emerged, the side that's a natural leader, a person who uses his commitment to the greater good on a grander scale than previously.
Unfortunately -- or maybe not -- a White woman from a Western human rights group has been assigned to be a monitor of his trial and detention. She (Hannah) becomes infatuated with Sonny, and they become comrades in the fight for equality and then lovers. Quickly, Sonny's son Will finds out, and his teenage anger drives a wedge between him and his father. And Will senses fairly early that his sister and mother have discovered the truth as well, though none of them speak of it.
Over the next several years, Sonny spends more time with his lover, and he loses touch with the daily life of his family as his son matures through high school, his daughter leaves to join the violent resistance from another country, and his wife takes her own path. In the end, the family has splintered, even as the country as started to dismantle the worst of its oppressive system on the way to the democracy we know today (which governs what is still a deeply flawed and unequal economy).
So, all of the above is told by Will as the first novel he's written. It's more of a diary, as he says it's not a novel he can publish; he's no spill-the-crap memoirist. And he admits late in the story that he's had to imagine and make up huge parts of it, as he has no idea what he father and Hannah said to each other, or how they held each other, or how they made love. He's just guessing. And he guesses about his parents passions as well -- and while that might seem ridiculous, you can remember that he was raised in a house without any privacy, and it's likely he knows more than a typical American kids knows about his parents.
Will is angry at his father for the affair. But he's also ashamed of himself for fantasizing about White women. Hannah is a natural blond with pale skin reddened by the heat of Johannesburg and the dust of the city. She's freckled, and somewhat overweight. She dresses poorly, a ragtag agglomeration of hippie clothing representing cultures she admires but is not a part of. In contrast, Aila (Will's mother) is elegant, tall, perfectly tailored. She has beautiful long hair, in contrast to Hannah's frizzy mop. Even Hannah's arresting blue eyes are described as small, and therefore inferior to the large, deep brown of Aila's. It's a wonderful subversion that everything about Aila physically is more alluring than Hannah, except that Hannah is White. And as another subversion, Hannah is imagined by Will as much more sexually willing than his rather shy mother.
Sonny is wracked with guilt because he is at heart a good man. Will makes the case, indirectly, that Sonny would be best off with two wives, as each woman brings out the best in him. Aila brings out his care for his community, his love of family. Hannah brings out his brains and his commitment, and she awakens in him a sensuality he hadn't even dared to imagine. There's one scene when both woman are at a party with Sonny where he's due to make speech, and he realizes that he drives strength from both of them; that their presence together makes him stronger than being with only one or the other.
But Sonny isn't going to push for the unusual situation of having both women together. That's tough enough in any society, and it would have been impossible in that one. It would have been fatal. So he maintains his fictions and manages as best he can.
Because it's South Africa at a time of turmoil, managing the best you can doesn't guarantee safety or happiness. As noted previously, Sonny has been arrested and jailed. He has moved his family into an Afrikaner neighborhood -- a middle-class area -- where he's officially not allowed. But the test of the restrictions goes reasonably well because his wife is so elegant, and his kids are so well behaved. But eventually, everything unravels. Baby goes through a flirtatious teenage period, smoking dope and presumably hooking up with lots of guys. She drops out of college and eventually joins a group that believes that violence is needed to speed up the overthrow of apartheid. In other words, that her father's way isn't enough. Sonny and Aila are actually proud of her, though scared. They don't see it as a repudiation of Sonny's more gradualist approach -- an approach which has had a lot of successes, and which is hardly timid, as he's led walkouts and strikes, and he has barely escaped being shot in a riot. They see it as her choice as a mature woman.
But anyway, her actions lead to Aila's arrest on terrorism charges more serious than those leveled at Sonny a few years before. And that arrest breaks up the family unit permanently -- another testament to apartheid.
It's a dramatic story, and the nuances are beautifully spelled out. It's one logical decision after another, or maybe emotional decision. They have consequences, and they are weighed carefully before being taken. But they are inevitable if we are to live a life we can be proud of.
If I had to find something to criticize in the book, it's the framework that it's told through Will's eyes. He acts like an omniscient narrator, but then he admits he's not. This makes for awkward phrasing at times that is hard to follow and requires rereading passages (not the worst thing in the world, by the way). The format is helpful in giving the view of his anger, of the impact of political and personal and sexual decisions made by his father on him, and how he and his mother deal with the consequences. It brings home how the political truly is personal. But it also therefore keeps the actual politics at a distance, since Will is not actually involved in the protests, the meetings, or the personal affairs. He's acted upon, not the actor -- and I guess that's the point as well.
This book has so many layers that it's worthy of multiple reads and should be part of any serious book group's reading list. Whether it's the political-is-personal, or the portrayal of the two women, or the radicalization of people any why, or how different classes were treated in South Africa, or how a funeral can turn into a riot, or life with dignity in a shack, or living in a land of fear and hatred --- well, it's all there.
I realize that there are books about apartheid -- fiction, memoir and history -- that deal with the issues more bluntly and with more terror and sadness. I get it that this book is only one slice of what life would have been like in the 1970s and 1980s. But it's so compellingly real and so remarkably astute about how we come to crossroads decisions in our lives that I feel as if lived it myself. (Lived it from my comfortable US suburbia.)
The story is told by a young man, Will, about his parents' relationship, his father's long affair, and the coming of age of Will and his sister 'Baby'. All of it is set against the forces of apartheid and the ways that it particularly affects his 'colored' class family. For a while, they settle reasonably comfortably and take pride in their status and contribution to society. But just as the racist illogic of apartheid was untenable, so too are the lies you must tell yourself and the limitations you are told to accept. You can either allow it to kill you (metaphorically), or you can fight it even if it means you might be killed (for real).
Will's parents are 'colored,' rather than 'black.' This gives them privileges unavailable to the larger population of descendants of the Africans who lived there for millennia. Will's father, Sonny, is a brilliant teacher, who loves Shakespeare (thus the name Will for his son), and becomes a school teacher, an achievement that fills his villager relatives with pride. Sonny's family lives on the outskirts of Johannesburg, in an area reserved for coloreds, in a shack that passed for standard housing in the area. Sonny's wife Aila is beautiful, regal, quiet and reserved. Both she and Sonny prioritize dignity, particularly given the limits placed on their lives. They always look great, talk properly, and do the right thing. They are respected in their colored community as people to whom others can turn to for advice and help -- achingly, in conditions such as women who come to Sonny to ask him to get their husbands to stop beating them.
At some point, however, Sonny decides to support his students when they want to protest against bad conditions they face. His ability to speak to the students and also to an assembly brings him greater renown within the community. And this brings him to the attention of groups that are protesting apartheid. At this time, these groups are basically outlawed, with only the most benign types of requests allowed. Sonny had been content to be on the mild side, such as asking White members of social clubs to donate old clothes and books for colored kids.
But he gradually becomes radicalized and becomes a quiet, respected leader of the opposition. He's fired as a schoolteacher, and he goes to more and more clandestine meetings. Eventually, he's arrested, convicted, and held in jail for about two years. He comes out a changed man, harder in his commitment and distanced from his family. He's still the same Sonny, but a different side of him has emerged, the side that's a natural leader, a person who uses his commitment to the greater good on a grander scale than previously.
Unfortunately -- or maybe not -- a White woman from a Western human rights group has been assigned to be a monitor of his trial and detention. She (Hannah) becomes infatuated with Sonny, and they become comrades in the fight for equality and then lovers. Quickly, Sonny's son Will finds out, and his teenage anger drives a wedge between him and his father. And Will senses fairly early that his sister and mother have discovered the truth as well, though none of them speak of it.
Over the next several years, Sonny spends more time with his lover, and he loses touch with the daily life of his family as his son matures through high school, his daughter leaves to join the violent resistance from another country, and his wife takes her own path. In the end, the family has splintered, even as the country as started to dismantle the worst of its oppressive system on the way to the democracy we know today (which governs what is still a deeply flawed and unequal economy).
So, all of the above is told by Will as the first novel he's written. It's more of a diary, as he says it's not a novel he can publish; he's no spill-the-crap memoirist. And he admits late in the story that he's had to imagine and make up huge parts of it, as he has no idea what he father and Hannah said to each other, or how they held each other, or how they made love. He's just guessing. And he guesses about his parents passions as well -- and while that might seem ridiculous, you can remember that he was raised in a house without any privacy, and it's likely he knows more than a typical American kids knows about his parents.
Will is angry at his father for the affair. But he's also ashamed of himself for fantasizing about White women. Hannah is a natural blond with pale skin reddened by the heat of Johannesburg and the dust of the city. She's freckled, and somewhat overweight. She dresses poorly, a ragtag agglomeration of hippie clothing representing cultures she admires but is not a part of. In contrast, Aila (Will's mother) is elegant, tall, perfectly tailored. She has beautiful long hair, in contrast to Hannah's frizzy mop. Even Hannah's arresting blue eyes are described as small, and therefore inferior to the large, deep brown of Aila's. It's a wonderful subversion that everything about Aila physically is more alluring than Hannah, except that Hannah is White. And as another subversion, Hannah is imagined by Will as much more sexually willing than his rather shy mother.
Sonny is wracked with guilt because he is at heart a good man. Will makes the case, indirectly, that Sonny would be best off with two wives, as each woman brings out the best in him. Aila brings out his care for his community, his love of family. Hannah brings out his brains and his commitment, and she awakens in him a sensuality he hadn't even dared to imagine. There's one scene when both woman are at a party with Sonny where he's due to make speech, and he realizes that he drives strength from both of them; that their presence together makes him stronger than being with only one or the other.
But Sonny isn't going to push for the unusual situation of having both women together. That's tough enough in any society, and it would have been impossible in that one. It would have been fatal. So he maintains his fictions and manages as best he can.
Because it's South Africa at a time of turmoil, managing the best you can doesn't guarantee safety or happiness. As noted previously, Sonny has been arrested and jailed. He has moved his family into an Afrikaner neighborhood -- a middle-class area -- where he's officially not allowed. But the test of the restrictions goes reasonably well because his wife is so elegant, and his kids are so well behaved. But eventually, everything unravels. Baby goes through a flirtatious teenage period, smoking dope and presumably hooking up with lots of guys. She drops out of college and eventually joins a group that believes that violence is needed to speed up the overthrow of apartheid. In other words, that her father's way isn't enough. Sonny and Aila are actually proud of her, though scared. They don't see it as a repudiation of Sonny's more gradualist approach -- an approach which has had a lot of successes, and which is hardly timid, as he's led walkouts and strikes, and he has barely escaped being shot in a riot. They see it as her choice as a mature woman.
But anyway, her actions lead to Aila's arrest on terrorism charges more serious than those leveled at Sonny a few years before. And that arrest breaks up the family unit permanently -- another testament to apartheid.
It's a dramatic story, and the nuances are beautifully spelled out. It's one logical decision after another, or maybe emotional decision. They have consequences, and they are weighed carefully before being taken. But they are inevitable if we are to live a life we can be proud of.
If I had to find something to criticize in the book, it's the framework that it's told through Will's eyes. He acts like an omniscient narrator, but then he admits he's not. This makes for awkward phrasing at times that is hard to follow and requires rereading passages (not the worst thing in the world, by the way). The format is helpful in giving the view of his anger, of the impact of political and personal and sexual decisions made by his father on him, and how he and his mother deal with the consequences. It brings home how the political truly is personal. But it also therefore keeps the actual politics at a distance, since Will is not actually involved in the protests, the meetings, or the personal affairs. He's acted upon, not the actor -- and I guess that's the point as well.
This book has so many layers that it's worthy of multiple reads and should be part of any serious book group's reading list. Whether it's the political-is-personal, or the portrayal of the two women, or the radicalization of people any why, or how different classes were treated in South Africa, or how a funeral can turn into a riot, or life with dignity in a shack, or living in a land of fear and hatred --- well, it's all there.
December 21, 2016
My Son's Story is a tough read. The prose is gritty, but it is not evocative naturally; it instead engages the reader to look for a connection. With each paragraph, there is a feeling of discomfort. The effort that goes to create and depict a unity between aspirations (self) of equality (of freedom) and context (other) of the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa is distinctive. The movement itself is not the highlight of the story. It is more a story of a transition from the innocence of adolescence to the harshness of reality.
The struggle is deeply personal for Sonny and his family, and it unfolds very differently for each member who becomes a part of it. The magnetism of the fight I find is the essence of the resistance - the felt voice of the collective.
The family becomes the individual unit in the struggle, and each member has a separate identity albeit a proclivity to follow the head of the household. This subtle gender motif grounds the story very firmly in my mind. Particularly the story of Aila, the wife, and mother. While there is general attribution of imagination and change to the father, there is an idea of continuity expressed through the silent wife and protective mother, Aila. It makes me feel the dynamics of family life otherwise and in times of crises; and here it is both in the private and public sphere (family and the movement).
Hannah's (the lover) position questions continuity, and in fact engages with the imagination and idea of resistance and change; quite the opposite to Aila.
The revelation of the title, I leave it for you to discover, again establishes the story firmly in my mind. The juxtaposition of the son's voice with the author depicts the generational perspective that emerges as a third layer of locating the story globally. It makes the novel truly a work of literary merit.
"There came a point, not possible to determine exactly when, at which equality became a cry that couldn't be made out, had been misheard or misinterpreted, turned out to be something else - finer. Freedom."
The struggle is deeply personal for Sonny and his family, and it unfolds very differently for each member who becomes a part of it. The magnetism of the fight I find is the essence of the resistance - the felt voice of the collective.
"The blacks were accustomed to closeness. In queues for transport, for work permits, for housing allocation, for all the stamped paper that authorized their lives; loaded into overcrowded trains and buses, fitting a family into one room, they cannot keep the outline of space - another, invisible skin - whites project around themselves, distanced from each other in everything but sexual and parental intimacy. [...]One ultimate body of bodies was inhaling and exhaling in the single diastole and systole, and above was the freedom of the great open afternoon sky."
The family becomes the individual unit in the struggle, and each member has a separate identity albeit a proclivity to follow the head of the household. This subtle gender motif grounds the story very firmly in my mind. Particularly the story of Aila, the wife, and mother. While there is general attribution of imagination and change to the father, there is an idea of continuity expressed through the silent wife and protective mother, Aila. It makes me feel the dynamics of family life otherwise and in times of crises; and here it is both in the private and public sphere (family and the movement).
"The nature of work she [Hannah] did develops high emotions. It arises from crises. It deals only with disruption, disjunction - circumstances in peoples' lives that cannot be met with the responses that serve for continuity."
Hannah's (the lover) position questions continuity, and in fact engages with the imagination and idea of resistance and change; quite the opposite to Aila.
The revelation of the title, I leave it for you to discover, again establishes the story firmly in my mind. The juxtaposition of the son's voice with the author depicts the generational perspective that emerges as a third layer of locating the story globally. It makes the novel truly a work of literary merit.
February 16, 2009
My dear friend Carrie lent me this book, which made me both elated (I love getting book recommendations!) and nervous (what if I didn't like it). My fears were totally groundless though - the book is awesome. I had only heard of Gordimer in the context of a long New York Review of Books article about South African writers, which as is sometimes the case with the NYRB, made me feel like I knew everything about her, and didn't need to actually read her work. Big mistake! (And worse, probably means I need to run out and grab me some Doris Lessing, too. No Coetzee, though - I read Disgrace and that was enough for me.)
Anway, My Son's Story takes place in South Africa, before the end of apartheid. It revolves around one black family and their experiences under that system. It starts with the son, Will, exiting a movie theater one day to find his father clearly out on a date with another woman (and a white one at that). From that point it details the family history both before and after this incident. Without giving too much away, what blew me away about the novel is how deftly it intertwines the personal and the political. Gordimer captures so clearly how, no matter what, no person who lived in this corrupt system - whether an activist (like his father) or not (like his mother) could escape its tentacles. What seems like two stories - the political activity and the personal betrayal, is really one story - because the two are inseparable. Sonny, the father, realizes at the end of the novel that, regarding his revolutionary-girlfriend, Hannah, the international activist, "ut the centre of life wasn't there, with her, the centre of life was where the banalities are enacted - the fuss over births, marriages, family affairs with their survival rituals of food and clothing..." In this case it is true. You cannot have one life with your revolutionary girlfriend and protect your family from it - the center of life is with your family, and no matter what you do, it is all interconnected. And those who are happiest are those (like his mother and sister) who embrace that the personal and political must be the same, if one is to be a fulfilled person. Neither Sonny who tries to separate the two, nor Will, who rejects the political entirely are whole people - until the very last pages, when Will embraces his own political act in the only way he could.
This is also a book about fathers and sons, and how they wound each other, and need each other and resent each other and feed off each other, and that could be the subject of an honors thesis, not just a blog post, so I will leave it at that. Very interesting stuff. Go read My Son's Story - you will be rewarded.
Anway, My Son's Story takes place in South Africa, before the end of apartheid. It revolves around one black family and their experiences under that system. It starts with the son, Will, exiting a movie theater one day to find his father clearly out on a date with another woman (and a white one at that). From that point it details the family history both before and after this incident. Without giving too much away, what blew me away about the novel is how deftly it intertwines the personal and the political. Gordimer captures so clearly how, no matter what, no person who lived in this corrupt system - whether an activist (like his father) or not (like his mother) could escape its tentacles. What seems like two stories - the political activity and the personal betrayal, is really one story - because the two are inseparable. Sonny, the father, realizes at the end of the novel that, regarding his revolutionary-girlfriend, Hannah, the international activist, "ut the centre of life wasn't there, with her, the centre of life was where the banalities are enacted - the fuss over births, marriages, family affairs with their survival rituals of food and clothing..." In this case it is true. You cannot have one life with your revolutionary girlfriend and protect your family from it - the center of life is with your family, and no matter what you do, it is all interconnected. And those who are happiest are those (like his mother and sister) who embrace that the personal and political must be the same, if one is to be a fulfilled person. Neither Sonny who tries to separate the two, nor Will, who rejects the political entirely are whole people - until the very last pages, when Will embraces his own political act in the only way he could.
This is also a book about fathers and sons, and how they wound each other, and need each other and resent each other and feed off each other, and that could be the subject of an honors thesis, not just a blog post, so I will leave it at that. Very interesting stuff. Go read My Son's Story - you will be rewarded.
June 20, 2020
I literally stumbled upon Nadine Gordimer and this beautifully written novel. I’d heard of Gordimer before, but never really picked up anything by her until I found My Son’s Story in my bookshelf. I don’t even remember when and how the book got there. But I’m so glad it did.
Her writing left me speechless. There is something about her prose that’s very different – tenses mixed up, punctuation placed in odd places. But I found beauty in this, perhaps a way to put into words her characters’ many fast thoughts.
I found that Gordimer has a way with words and with prose, managing to say so much with very few words. Not many authors do this. Her prose feels like gliding on the tip of an iceberg, the only difference being that she actually lets you see through the water and take in the size of what’s buried underneath. How deep you’ll go depends on you as a reader, and of course will be very subjective.
To me this book was about more than just the powerful, complex, deep and important relationship between a son and his father. It’s also about the relationship of a son with his mother, and that between husband and wife. The character of the sister felt a little distant to me. There’s a lot going on in this family, this on top of the deep historical background of the novel, something I personally knew very little about before.
I’ll leave this passage here, because it left me breathless after reading it.
The dogs from the main house followed me bounding and snarling across the grass and I tore at shrubs and threw branches at them. I was barefoot and they snapped at my calves as I raced to the steps. Now it’s my turn to hammer. I flung back the broken screen door and beat upon the wooden one with both fists. I didn’t call on my father; Sonny, I bellowed, Sonny. Sonny. Sonny. Sonny. There was no-one there. I went on beating at the door and was disgusted to find my fists, my face wet. For the second time, first as a youth with a breaking voice, now as a man, I wept.
Her writing left me speechless. There is something about her prose that’s very different – tenses mixed up, punctuation placed in odd places. But I found beauty in this, perhaps a way to put into words her characters’ many fast thoughts.
I found that Gordimer has a way with words and with prose, managing to say so much with very few words. Not many authors do this. Her prose feels like gliding on the tip of an iceberg, the only difference being that she actually lets you see through the water and take in the size of what’s buried underneath. How deep you’ll go depends on you as a reader, and of course will be very subjective.
To me this book was about more than just the powerful, complex, deep and important relationship between a son and his father. It’s also about the relationship of a son with his mother, and that between husband and wife. The character of the sister felt a little distant to me. There’s a lot going on in this family, this on top of the deep historical background of the novel, something I personally knew very little about before.
I’ll leave this passage here, because it left me breathless after reading it.
The dogs from the main house followed me bounding and snarling across the grass and I tore at shrubs and threw branches at them. I was barefoot and they snapped at my calves as I raced to the steps. Now it’s my turn to hammer. I flung back the broken screen door and beat upon the wooden one with both fists. I didn’t call on my father; Sonny, I bellowed, Sonny. Sonny. Sonny. Sonny. There was no-one there. I went on beating at the door and was disgusted to find my fists, my face wet. For the second time, first as a youth with a breaking voice, now as a man, I wept.
April 15, 2012
Sinceramente leggere questo libro non era in programma, considerando che non è neanche nella mia wish list, ma penso che mi abbia chiamato e come tutte le cose inaspettate, è stato un bel dono leggerlo.
"Storia di mio figlio" è una storia di passioni, emozioni forti e di lotta politica. E' una storia di un uomo, Sonnny, un insegnante che si è sempre battuto per "quelli come lui", ovvero la popolazione nera,ma anche un ex detenuto imprigionato per "crimini politici" diviso dall'amore per due donne: la moglie Aila, una donna apparentemente remissiva e pacata e Hanna, "una biondina slavata" che condivide con lui gli stessi ideali rivoluzionari e politici. E'una storia di amore filiale, tra Sonny e suo figlio William, detto Will (in onore di Shakespeare), che scopre la relazione tra il padre e Hannah, una mattina che decide di marinare la scuola, ma è anche e soprattutto l'amore per la libertà, per chi lotta assiduamente affinché la popolazione nera abbia gli stessi diritti dei bianchi.
Consigliato a chi già conosce la Gordimer, a chi come me si approccia per la prima volta a questa scrittrice che da anni lotta contro l'apartheid.
"Storia di mio figlio" è una storia di passioni, emozioni forti e di lotta politica. E' una storia di un uomo, Sonnny, un insegnante che si è sempre battuto per "quelli come lui", ovvero la popolazione nera,ma anche un ex detenuto imprigionato per "crimini politici" diviso dall'amore per due donne: la moglie Aila, una donna apparentemente remissiva e pacata e Hanna, "una biondina slavata" che condivide con lui gli stessi ideali rivoluzionari e politici. E'una storia di amore filiale, tra Sonny e suo figlio William, detto Will (in onore di Shakespeare), che scopre la relazione tra il padre e Hannah, una mattina che decide di marinare la scuola, ma è anche e soprattutto l'amore per la libertà, per chi lotta assiduamente affinché la popolazione nera abbia gli stessi diritti dei bianchi.
Consigliato a chi già conosce la Gordimer, a chi come me si approccia per la prima volta a questa scrittrice che da anni lotta contro l'apartheid.
October 12, 2009
A young, black South African, who is playing hookey at a local cinema, runs into his father, a former school teacher and now an anti-apartheid political activist, in the company of a blond woman who is obviously his lover. Thus begins a tale, told primarily by the son, of complex political and familial entanglements. Gordimer is an astute observer of the way lives, complicated enough already, become even more so in a treacherous and ever-shifting political landscape like that which existed in her native South Africa for so many years. She is also a master of shifting point-of-view and illustrates here not only how a son’s vision of his father slowly changes over time but also how that father’s action might be seen from perspectives outside of the family. Still the tale of the family dominates, and the biggest surprise in this novel comes from within the family. That surprise should not be ruined here. Suffice it to say that Gordimer is always a challenging and rewarding read. I continue to be a very big fan!
November 24, 2022
Phiên bản tiếng Việt có tên là Thần tượng.
Nội dung bên dưới là copy lại từ trang tve-4u.org tóm lược về tác phẩm
William, tên thường gọi là Will, trốn học, băng qua cả thành phố đi coi phim, cốt để không bị người quen bắt gặp. Nhưng cậu lại chạm trán cha mình ở ngay phòng đợi của rạp xi-nê ấy. Ông đang đi cùng với một người đàn bà da trắng, tóc vàng.
Đó là một rủi ro rất bình thường. Song cha cậu không phải là một người bình thường, và gia đình cậu, bị biết bao sự việc đang xảy ra đe dọa cuộc sống của họ, cũng không phải là một gia đình bình thường.
Thần tượng là một câu truyện rất cảm động, viết về tình yêu của một người đàn ông với hai người phụ nữ, của người cha với con trai và ngay cả cái tình yêu trừu tượng hơn – tình yêu tự do – cũng được nhắc tới trong tác phẩm. Trong Thần tượng, những mâu thuẫn cá nhân và cuộc đấu tranh của cả cộng đồng chống lại chủ nghĩa Apartheid được đẩy lên kịch tính rất cao. Đó cũng chính là cái giá mà những con người như Sonny và gia đình ông phải trả để tạo nên những chuyển biến trong xã hội Nam Phi.
Nội dung bên dưới là copy lại từ trang tve-4u.org tóm lược về tác phẩm
William, tên thường gọi là Will, trốn học, băng qua cả thành phố đi coi phim, cốt để không bị người quen bắt gặp. Nhưng cậu lại chạm trán cha mình ở ngay phòng đợi của rạp xi-nê ấy. Ông đang đi cùng với một người đàn bà da trắng, tóc vàng.
Đó là một rủi ro rất bình thường. Song cha cậu không phải là một người bình thường, và gia đình cậu, bị biết bao sự việc đang xảy ra đe dọa cuộc sống của họ, cũng không phải là một gia đình bình thường.
Thần tượng là một câu truyện rất cảm động, viết về tình yêu của một người đàn ông với hai người phụ nữ, của người cha với con trai và ngay cả cái tình yêu trừu tượng hơn – tình yêu tự do – cũng được nhắc tới trong tác phẩm. Trong Thần tượng, những mâu thuẫn cá nhân và cuộc đấu tranh của cả cộng đồng chống lại chủ nghĩa Apartheid được đẩy lên kịch tính rất cao. Đó cũng chính là cái giá mà những con người như Sonny và gia đình ông phải trả để tạo nên những chuyển biến trong xã hội Nam Phi.
May 4, 2020
I just kind of hated it, really, which is why it took so long to get through.
Gordimer has created a story filled with unlikeable characters, who it’s impossible to care what becomes of them. Whilst I can draw parallels with some of the unsavoury characters in Disgrace by Coetzee, which made me angry, at least that book gripped me and drew me in, it did what it was meant to. With this, I was just bored.
Aside from the characters, Gordimer’s style of writing didn’t do it for me. Unnecessarily verbose, rather indulgent, it left little room for the plot (such as it was, and it was pretty weak) to develop at any kind of pace. By the time you got to the end of another rambling paragraph you didn’t give a damn where the story was going to go anyway.
I read this out of curiousity as to what constitutes a Nobel worthy piece of writing but perhaps had I noticed the year she received the Prize, I may have saved myself some unenjoyable hours spent reading this.
Gordimer has created a story filled with unlikeable characters, who it’s impossible to care what becomes of them. Whilst I can draw parallels with some of the unsavoury characters in Disgrace by Coetzee, which made me angry, at least that book gripped me and drew me in, it did what it was meant to. With this, I was just bored.
Aside from the characters, Gordimer’s style of writing didn’t do it for me. Unnecessarily verbose, rather indulgent, it left little room for the plot (such as it was, and it was pretty weak) to develop at any kind of pace. By the time you got to the end of another rambling paragraph you didn’t give a damn where the story was going to go anyway.
I read this out of curiousity as to what constitutes a Nobel worthy piece of writing but perhaps had I noticed the year she received the Prize, I may have saved myself some unenjoyable hours spent reading this.
October 16, 2017
'Bu dokuz genç yoldaşımızı geçen hafta vurup öldürenler için, bu ölümler gerçekten anlamsızdır. Bunlar anlamsız ölümlerdir; çünkü kaç insanımız öldürülürse öldürülsün, insanlarımızın ezilmesi sonsuza dek sürüp gitmeyecektir. Bize karşı girişilecek hiçbir şiddet hareketi, BARIŞ ve ADALET mücadelesini vurup öldürmeyecektir' - Sonny
Tam da memleketimin tecrübe ettiği barışın ve adaletin öldürülme cabaları sürecinde çok daha anlam taşıyan bir kitap oldu.
Irk ayrımının en sert muhaliflerinden Nobel ödüllü Güney Afrikalı yazar Nadine gordimer 'den Güney Afrika'da işgalci beyazların siyahların yaşam haklarını ellerinden almaya çalıştıkları bir dönemde, siyahların barış ve eşitlik arayışı yolundaki önderlerinden evli ve iki çocuk babası siyahi Sonny ve İnsan Hakları Örgütünde çalışan beyaz Hanna'nın arasında geçen aşk hikayesinin Sony'nin oğlunun gözünden hikayesidir.
Tam da memleketimin tecrübe ettiği barışın ve adaletin öldürülme cabaları sürecinde çok daha anlam taşıyan bir kitap oldu.
Irk ayrımının en sert muhaliflerinden Nobel ödüllü Güney Afrikalı yazar Nadine gordimer 'den Güney Afrika'da işgalci beyazların siyahların yaşam haklarını ellerinden almaya çalıştıkları bir dönemde, siyahların barış ve eşitlik arayışı yolundaki önderlerinden evli ve iki çocuk babası siyahi Sonny ve İnsan Hakları Örgütünde çalışan beyaz Hanna'nın arasında geçen aşk hikayesinin Sony'nin oğlunun gözünden hikayesidir.
August 9, 2021
Great book with very strong characters and even stronger and complicated relationships between them. The journey into adulthood, family life, values, the life and revolution of African Americans are all subjects that are somehow equally talked about in this book. It is written in a very unique and beautiful way that makes everything, even political situations easy to understand. You can feel the love, the despair, the anger, the passion of the revolution just as much as the characters do. It is a bit slow in some parts and you might have to try a little bit to not put it away in those moments. But all in all it's a very good book.
Currently reading
December 7, 2013Gotta pick back up my current Gordimer in honor of her BFF, Mandela...
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The coloured epic we've all been waiting for...
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The coloured epic we've all been waiting for...
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August 3, 2013I loved this. I read it about 10 years ago, though -- it's due a reread.
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