Nadine Gordimer so far is one of the most interesting African writers I’ve read. Her stories are fun to read and the meanings are always interesting to me. I really enjoyed reading her stories. Three of her stories are “Good Climate, Friendly Inhabitants”, “Amnesty”, and “Six Feet of the Country”.
In “Good Climate, Friendly Inhabitants” the main character is a ditzy, racist, mean white women. She looks young except for her face and legs. This makes her ditzy because your legs and face are what you mainly see when you look at someone. If neither looked young then you don’t look young. She was racist and mean to the black people around her especially at the mechanic shop she worked at. There was a guy named jack who ended up being a voice of reason in the story. He had two different names. Jack and Mpanza Makiwane. He says that Mpanza Makiwane isn’t really a name because its African not European. He thinks Jack isn’t a name because its English and not African. He’s kind of stuck in the middle of two totally different cultures. Finally, there is a conman who is white. He says he’s from zymbabya but he’s not. He cones the narrator using her for food, money, a place to stay, and sex. He threatened her could of hurt her. Jack stepped in even though he didn’t always like the main character and sent the man away so he couldn’t harm her. The moral of the story was the world is full of people you can’t trust.
I think the moral of this story is very interesting and true in my life and in the world. Personally for me it’s always hard to know who you can and can’t trust. This includes the government. English colonies in Africa don’t know if they can trust their government and the people around them also so this is on a world wide scale. This affects everyone. The world is full of crime and of people who take what they can get and try to con everyone else. I think people should become more aware of who they can and can’t trust in the world.
I think this is a very important moral because there are so many people who use each other and con each other in the world. This sometimes includes the government and we have to be aware of this just in case it does happen.
I really enjoyed this story out of all the other stories. Not just for the story line. The bigger picture and critique she includes just fascinate me. I really didn’t think much about this before until now and I really liked it. I would tell anyone who is interested in African literature, colonialism, or anyone in need of a good story to read this story.
You do a good job discussing the literal point of "Good Climate, Friendly Inhabitants." You also pose some interesting questions about trust. It is interesting to consider what you would suggest as criteria for trustworthiness: how do you decide if your government is swindling you? How do you decide that a given person is worth trusting?
ReplyDeleteIn your next posting, make sure that you also discuss the metaphorical points. In "Good Climate", Gordimer was pointing out that the unreliable narrator allowed her racism to blind her to who she could trust. Based on her prejudice, she trusted (and should not have) the white guy, and she did not trust (but should have) the black guy who saved her.