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CRY, THE BELOVED COUNTRY

I was about to return home from the West Coast on a red-eye flight.  Having finished reading my current book and anticipating being awake for most of the night, I searched through the shelves of books at my son’s home.  They are all avid readers and I knew I’d find something interesting and worthwhile to read.  Their open minds were evident as I went from shelf to shelf, finally settling on Cry, The Beloved Country by Alan Paton.  What piqued my interest to start with was the date it was written – 1948.  The book opens with Notes on the 1987, 1959 and 1948 editions.   I was ready to read a good classic.

Comments on the cover of the book reviewers of The New York Times and The New Republic proved to be so true: “A beautiful novel, rich, firm and moving… its writing is so fresh its projection of characters so immediate and full, its events so compelling , and its understanding so compassionate that to read the book is to share intimately, even to the point of catharsis, in the grave human experiences treated.” (The New York Times).  From The New Republic:” …an impassioned novel about a black man’s country under white man’s law is a work of wearing beauty… a deeply moving story of the Zulu pastor, Stephen Kumalo and his son Absalom, set against the background of a land and a people riven by racial injustice.  Remarkable for its lyricism, unforgettable for character and incident, Cry, the Beloved country is a classic work of love and hope, courage and endurance, born of the dignity of man.”

If you want your mind to be stirred, your heart to ache for another human being, this must be your next read.

Pastor Kumalo leaves his small burro in Natal for the city of Johannesburg at the urging of his wife, in response to a letter received from Theophilus Msimangu, a fellow pastor living in this great city.  Trembling, they opened the letter wondering if it could contain news of his brother John, or, his sister Gertrude, both having left the rural life for the city.  Or, could it be about their son, Absalom, who had also left in search of more?  Absalom, whom they had not heart from, but for whom their hearts ached?

Pastor Kumalo’s journey into Johannesburg brings the landscape of South Africa to life.  The help he received from his friend and the Christian community in this big, frightening city will warm your heart.  At one point, trying to express his thanks to Mrs. Lithebe who has opened her small house to him, and then also to Gertrude, feeding them from her small supply, she receives his thanks with “Why else do we live?”

This is a story of a father searching for his lost son, a lost sister, a lost brother.  The father in the 15^th chapter of Luke in the parable of the prodigal son will come to mind--a father with his forehead pressed to the windowpane, waiting, watching, hoping.  But Pastor Kumalo must return home to his wife with hard news and together they face the reality of their son’s circumstances.

I’m so thankful I “stumbled” upon this book! It has been good for me to be a part of Pastor Kumalo’s story.  You will feel likewise, I know.