Imaginings of Sand by André Brink is,
simply put, a masterpiece. Not only does it bring convincing characters to
life, flesh out the history of a people, portray the fortunes of a family
coping with imposed and unwanted change, it also addresses one of the main
political events of the late twentieth century. And André Brink´s novel does
all this without the slightest recourse to polemic or posturing. Its themes and
statements emerge from the shared lives of its characters. This is subtle
authorship at its most accomplished. How many novels might aspire even to one
of these achievements?
We are, as in many works by André Brink,
not only in South Africa, but also within the Afrikaner community. We see things through the eyes of Kristien,
who is clearly named after her grandmother, the dying Ouma, who is called
Kistina. The difference between the names is both slight and significant. They
may be separated by time and by political difference, but by the time history
has had a chance to view them both, they may be much more similar than first
sight might suggest. They are undoubtedly cast in different landscapes, not
only in time, but also in terms of the landmarks that might endow their
individual sense of permanence. Not only do their values seem different, surely
they conflict, given their different politics and ages. Mid-thirties Kristien,
of course, has been politically active, while her grandmother has lived on an
Afrikaner farm all her life.
Imaginings of Sand begins with Kristien
being summoned back to South Africa, because her grandmother is dying. In
London, Kristien has had ties with the African National Congress and has
campaigned against Apartheid. Her family, with roots stretching back to the
original Voortrekkers are, on the face of things, conventional Afrikaner
farmers, complete with black servants and employees alongside attitudes that
accept without question the supremacy of the Dutch Reform Church, allied to
supreme white skin and thus Apartheid.
The message to Kristien in London arrives
as South Africa faces change, just before its first multi-radial elections.
Apartheid is already a thing of the past, but not yet officially. Political
transition is feared by the Afrikaners and there has been much talk of feared
violence, even of bloodbath. Kristien´s family house has been attacked and set
on fire. Ouma was very old and perhaps frailer than she liked to admit, but now
trauma has taken her close to death. Her doctors expect it to be just a few
days hence. Her granddaughter insists she should die at home. She has the place
cleaned up and made habitable enough for herself and her grandmother, plus, of
course, the servant family.
Once home, Ouma Kristina begins to tell her
granddaughter the family history and her own life story. How much of it is
truth neither Kristien nor we will ever know. Whatever racial or cultural
purity the family in theory might claim, Ouma´s history of their ancestry
identifies the inevitable complexity. But a thread that runs throughout is the
central vulnerability of women. Sweet children, then playthings and finally
enforced child-bearers seems to be the repeated and indeed only pattern. Any
deviation assumes a break from both culture and identity, but it is a break
that anyone from an Afrikaner community finds almost impossible to accomplish.
Publicly condemned for any expression of independence, women are equally damned
for any sign of disloyalty to community or family or husband, no matter how
inconsiderate, lascivious or even violent he may be. For the first time,
Kristien comes to terms with the life her own mother led before she died all
too young.
History seems to have repeated itself a
number of times. Anna, Kristien´s sister, seems to be respectably but unhappily
married to Casper, who is both Boer and boor. When he is not chasing a woman´s
tail, he is busy organising what can only be described as a vigilante force to
anticipate problems of majority rule. They seem determined to get their
retaliation in first.
And so the tale of family and national
history unfolds. The politics of state, community, family and sex develop and
intertwine. Race, gender and class play their roles as well. But yet this novel
never descends into polemic. It is never less than credible, never less than
real. Its style, indeed, in often an African variety of magical realism that
both amplifies and enlivens the already fantastical stories of Ouma Kristina.
The plot always surprises, even to the very end, but none of these events,
however, bizarre, is anything less than credible, From the start, it is a
masterpiece.
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