WONDERFUL, HEARTBREAKING, UPLIFTING, AMAZING, OUTSTANDING

books:


	• Cry, the Beloved Country Alan Paton Scribner, 2003 - 320 pages average customer review:based on 246 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

Unbelievable

I can yet to fathom how some people gave this book 1, 2 and 3 stars out of five. Most of the people giving these low scores admitted that they were being forced to read the book at high school, and found it boring and dull. Please dont corrupt these reviews with those opinions.

The biggest problem is that most of the people rating the book low took it right out of the context for which it was intended. It was not written as a 'novel' in the conventional sense. It was a social commentry, a cry out to the hatred, the demise and the vehement degradation of the times. The book was to showcase the plight of the black South Africans on an international level. It had no intention of providing a source of entertainment for ignorant, naive, myopic minds of 15 year old some 55 years later.

Paton writing style has been criticized greatly in this forum. Remember, Paton was a poet- not a novelist. Most poetry is difficult to understand, and hard to read for long periods of time- but it is the imagery and flow that captures the imagination. Think of Cry, The Belovered Country as a poem- not a Michael Crichton or Tom Clancy thriller.

While probably NO-ONE will ever be able to understand Cry in the same way as those in the context and time it served, it will go down as one of the classic literature endevours of our time.

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WONDERFUL, HEARTBREAKING, UPLIFTING, AMAZING, OUTSTANDING

Hi. I'm a high-school student, a 9th grader to be exact. I was not assigned this book, but did pick it from a list to read for a report. I am EXTREMELY glad that I did. I do admit that it is hard to get into. In the beginning, I was quite annoyed at Paton for blatantly ignoring correct grammar on quotes, and if you don't get it, i would suggest just reading the first few chapters a couple times in a place where you can concentrate. If you can be patient this long, it will suddenly click. I picked up and put this book back down about twice in two weeks,just to read the first five chapters, but then i was able to get into it, and finished it within two days.
If you can perservere, get ready for a passionate, wonderful, brilliant ride. The characters are incredibly sincere, in both their good and bad sides. Paton does not try to make anyone a hero, even priests loose their temper at some point. What he does manage to do is make you laugh, open your mouth wide with astonishment, anger you, make you cry, and finally leave you with a sense of hope. This is an amazing book that captures the essense of South Africa's struggle for balance, in a time when white people were ripping away any structure the black Africans had, and expecting them to deal with what ideas and technology were brought from the western world. We read Kaffir Boy earlier this year, and it is very interesting to see the difference of opinion on little things like the Afrikaans language when a book is written by a white South African, and a black South African. (I...just don't know if i would recommend Kaffir Boy.)
This is...I've run out of adjectives. But this is a simply marvelous book, which EVERYONE needs to read. And understand. And enjoy. Because it's very hard not to.

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Wonderful story--really heart warming and tragically sad

This is one of my all time favorite books. I cried and I smiled at the same time. The story is very well written and tells a story about a wonderfully gentle man who does his best to help everyone he meets. Without telling too much of the story, he goes from a small village in the midst of incredible change and goes to the large city in search of two members of his family. Several situations arise, not always with a happy ending, but he faces them with sincerity, compassion, and a commitment that is inspiring. I took from this story the lesson that the worst situation that a person might ever have to deal with in their life that love can shine through and prove that there is a powerful goodness in man that is only waiting to be discovered and revealed.

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Amazing Book!

This book is amazing. It is by far the best book I have ever read. The story is heart-warming. I could not put it down. The characters come alive on the pages. Alan Paton handles a sensitive situation with compassion. I would highly recommend this to anyone. I hope you too find as much enjoyment as I did.

reviews: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, page 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20

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