Coconut by Kopano Matlwa - Bookclub selection August 2010

Coconut is a debut novel by Kopano Matlwa, a young South African writer. Its a social commentary on how upward mobility is being defined in post-apartheid South Africa.

December 2009 Book Selection: Mother to Mother by Sindiwe Magona

Discussed on: 12/12/2009
Hosted by Stella Rupiah

Characters:
Mandisa – the narrator
Mxolisi – 1st born son
Lunga – 2nd born son
Siziwe – 3rd born daughter
Dwadwa –3rd husband – Siziwe’s father
Lungile – 2nd partner – Lunga’s father
China – 1st husband – Mxolisi’s father
Mama – Mandisa’s Mom
Makhulu – maternal grandma
Amy Elizabeth Biehl – An American student murdered in Guguletu



Synopsis:
On Wednesday, 25th August, 1993, in a township of Guguletu, South Africa, a young American woman Fulbright Scholar, Amy Elizabeth Biehl, was killed by a mob of young township youth. Amy was white. This event happened in real life.

The major questions that arose were how could the youth kill a well-intentioned foreign student, who was sympathetic to their cause, came to South Africa with the intention of being part of the solution to the problems plaguing the land at the time?

Through this novel, Sindiwe Magona attempts to explain the reality of the youth of Black South Africa at the time. Through fictitious characters, she recreates for the reader, the circumstance in which the black youth of 1993 were born in, parenting, opportunities and neighborhood set-up which inevitably created the right brew for violence. The story is told through the voice of Mandisa, the mother of one of the young men, Mxolisi who was part of the mob that killed Amy Biehl.
Mandisa was born in pre-Group areas act era where blacks lived in their native communities. As part of the Apartheid rule, the South African government instituted The Group Areas Act, which organized neighborhoods according the races, creating separate neighborhoods for blacks, whites, colored (bi-racial) and Indians. The process of moving the blacks from their communities to arid ghettos where folks from different towns and neighborhoods were mashed together. The ghettos had inadequate housing, poor school systems and social infrastructures. The process was dehumanizing, fueling the hate in the community towards the White government. The separate and unequal Department of Bantu of Education which is responsible for the black education system ill-prepares the children for productive citizenship. Mandisa, who is raised by very religious parents and a mother who heavily guards her virginity, remains focused on education and she gives the reader hope that she will somehow, through education make it out of poverty. However, despite being a virgin she turns up pregnant by her teenage boyfriend, China through their heavy petting. The confusion around the conception of Mxolisi shapes the relationship the Mandisa and China have with their child and each other. Forced into a loveless marriage through the dictates of religion and tradition, Mandisa and China shelve their dreams of education and prosperity and settle into the life of unskilled labor existence. China, runs away from his family never to be seen nor heard from again. Mandisa then meets Lungile, a fast talking man who fathers her second born son, Lungile. Later Mandisa marries Dwadwa with whom she bears her only daughter Siziwe.

Mxolisi grows into a young man with no education opportunities, a rebellious spirit which is encouraged by the community as part of the struggle against the Apartheid government. Mxolisi witnesses police brutality at a very young age and this shapes his view of the world. With the Soweto uprising, the youth of South Africa proved to be a very important weapon in the fight for liberation and freedom. School rebellions and looting are met with admiration in the black community. Open expression of hatred towards whites is encouraged, acts of vandalism and violence are applauded. Mxolisi and his friends, drop out of school, in their idleness and lack of parental daytime presence (since all adults worked out of the neighborhood as day laborers in the white neighborhoods) cause havoc in the community, looting, killing each other with little or no response from police since it was black on black crime. However, on this particular Wednesday, against all social rules that forbade whites from visiting the black ghettos, Amy Biehl drives into Guguletu, is seen by this mob. She is stabbed several times and dies. The police force is unleashed into the community to hunt down the killers; the community realizes the implication of killing an Abelungu woman. There is a clear acceptance that there is great value placed on the life a white woman rather than the black citizens. Some community members label Mandisa as the mother of a murderer, while the Anti-Apartheid movement (which is underground) view this as part of the struggle and hide Mxolisi from the police as a freedom fighter.
The death of Amy Biehl is part of the collateral damage of volatile situation that had been brewing for long time.

Discussion:

Sindiwe style of writing is riveting; she tells the story through the voice of Mandisa, Mxolisi’s mother who writes a letter to the mother of Amy Elizabeth Biehl explaining her son’s. She acknowledges the fact that when a homicide occurs there are two sets of victims, the murderer’s family and the murderer’s family are both in mourning. Without minimizing the pain the Biehl family felt, realizing the gravity of taking someone’s life, Sindiwe carefully creates Mxolisi’s reality. She is careful not to use Mxolisi’s background as an excuse but rather just states his life’s circumstances as a non-negotiable reality.

The rawness with which Sindiwe describes the feelings Mandisa has towards Mxolisi’s conception, a mother who inwardly loathes her own child because his arrival symbolized the falling apart of dreams touches the core of motherhood. Clearly, her loath does not translate into hate or lack of love for her son. Mxolisi birth also shows the role religion and culture play in perpetuating loveless marriages which in the long run don’t benefit the individuals. It’s clear that had Mandisa not married China, she could have returned to school and hopefully attained a higher level of education.

The bleakness of the future of Mxolisi’s generation made them perfect anti-apartheid fighters through defiance, anarchy and extreme violence (neck-lacing and rape). Their acts of violence were applauded. These are circumstances that worked while they are young, as a reader you are left to wonder what the adult version of Mxolisi looks like. True to form, without a proper educational foundation, these young freedom fighters are not positioned to reap the fruits of a black-led South Africa.

Sindiwe Magona, through Mother to Mother, has given future generations a comprehensive social commentary on the life of Young Black people in South Africa during the Apartheid era.

How does the book apply to present day South Africa?

Upon dismantling the Apartheid government in South Africa, President Nelson Mandela took the country through a cleansing phase through the Truth and Reconciliation process. This process allowed the perpetrators of violence (of ALL races) talk about what the crimes they committed, face their victims and in exchange be forgiven. Publically this allowed the country to move on through a peaceful transitional period. However, what this process failed to acknowledge was that there was a whole generation of vibrant black youth, full of hope for the future but are not in a position to participate in the newly won economical prosperity. Due to lack of education, they navigate through post apartheid South Africa as unskilled labor, unemployed watching foreign labor fill the huge skilled labor gaps. The only skill-set they have is violence. The South African government as part of their Truth and Reconciliation efforts did not embark on the necessary rehabilitation phase which would have given a large mass of young a chance to unlearn their violent response to societal challenges, and find other productive ways of contributing to society. As a result, South Africa is now labeled the ‘Rape Capital’ of the world; we have recently witness the manifestation of Xenophobia against fellow African immigrants and a surge in violent crimes.

Conclusion: The book club members loved this book. A lot of us identified with some of the characters in the story e.g. mother to child relationships, family reactions to teen pregnancies, the substandard Bantu educational system, forced marriages etc. This book comes highly recommended. Sindiwe Magona is a true African literary gem.

Other Works by Sindiwe Magona:
Push Push by Sindiwe Magona
Living, Loving and Lying awake at night by Sindiwe Magona
To my Children’s Children by Sindiwe Magona
Forced to Grow by Sindiwe Magona