One of the best book I read in 2008. The prose is beautiful, graceful, insightful and wise. It’s a very easy read, layered with meanings. This story, set in apartheid South Africa, will tug at your heartstrings. Highly recommended. ( )

A lot like Things Fall Apart ( )

I read this book practically on the heels of The Grass is Singing which were written at about the same time and about the same subject, relationship between the whites and the natives of South Africa. I came away from Cry, the Beloved Country book feeling exactly the opposite of what I did after reading The Grass is Singing. Both evoked intense feelings, but while TGIS emphasized the racial tensions, CTBC spoke of harmony, of forgiveness, of benevolence on the part of the colonial masters. While Lessing talked of the harsh, dry and unforgiving land, Paton spoke of the gentle hills and the vast plain, of promise and rain - South Africa's two faces. Lessing writes in spare prose, while Paton's prose is as if bibilical poetry.

Did I like this book? Yes, but not as much as most people do. It is heartbreaking, sad, inspiring, but it borders on paternalistic, where the little coloured man is white man's burden (even in spite of the wrong done him here). For it's Christian themes of love, forgiveness, compassion and hope, I recommend this book and I'm glad to have read it. But I prefer Lessing's, Gordimer's, and Coetzee's South Africa any time. ( )

I am deeply saddened, angered and touched. I just finished by Alan Paton' Cry, the Beloved Country. Saddened, because in this book, written in 1958 about South Africa there is barely a character who comes out as a winner after tribulation. I am angered, because the aforementioned tribulations are moree structural than personal. That is the strength of Paton's book to show through the stories of individuals what was wrong with his society. Also angered,because even today in the US there are people who are racist, because they are unable to see the structural damage that was caused by slavery, Jim Crow and segregation. The blaming the victim mentality and focusing on symptoms of societal problems instead of (or rather in addition to ) the causes is maddening. But mostly I am touched by the beauty of simple words, simple life and simple story of Kumalo, his family and circles. I can certainly see Steinbeck's influence on him. Very tight writing without any unnecessary adjective.

My words could never do justice to this story of the search of Rev. Steven Kumalo, a Zulu man, for his son Absalom in the streets of 1940s Johannesburg. It's sheer poetry, a deep look at racial prejudice and injustice but also truth and hope. Get a copy and read it already.
--J. ( )