Great Simplicity; Great Depth; Remarkable Humanity

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	• Cry, the Beloved Country Alan Paton Scribner, 2003 - 320 pages average customer review:based on 241 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

South Africa - 60 Years Past

Although this book is about 60 years old I just read it for the 1st time. It is a keeper and a treasure. It is a book that you will want to revisit often at least for awhile. I find the book to be filled with spiritual messages. You will see the making of aparthaid long before it was abolished. The story itself is quite suspenseful and Paton's writing style is unique. I like it.

So Glad I Discovered This Book!

The story of one man's quest to find his son and to seek forgiveness. I had never heard of this book prior to the 1001 Books To Read list (it had not been required reading in high school), and I am sorry I didn't read earlier. This book is one of the most memorable books I've ever read, and I know I will look forward to re-reading it again one day.

I understand some here have not taken kindly to Mr. Paton's writing style, but I found it engaging and very easy to read. His descriptive style, for me, was far from boring and kept me involved in the story to the point where I could envision all that was happening. For me, his words just flowed so evenly.

The story may be a little dated for today's politics being as the novel was written in 1946; however, it provides a thought-provoking point of view of the beginnings of apartheid in South Africa. The issues are complex, and the answers are not always easy or simple, but the effect on people is amazing and long-lasting. Mr. Paton describes how every facet of life is touched through this horrible policy. The dilemma of complexity is driven home when the stories of two men, Kumalo and Jarvis - one black, the other white - come together. Sympathies for both men are strong and the reader can find their hearts wrenched at what happens simply because that's the way it is done.

Well done and thoroughly enjoyed!

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Kind Of Boring...

I had to read this book for school, and we just finished it a couple days ago. Now, I'm not saying that it was a horrible book because it wasn't. I can honestly say it was one of the better books I've read for school. (I really, really hate it when we have to read those old, English classics.) But it wasn't what I expected it to be at all. I was expecting a brilliant piece of work about racial and prejudice problems of South Africa, but I found those things to be a sidenote of this novel. It was mostly about a quiet, humble pastor looking for his family. While it was touching that he did eventually find all of his family, I thought there should have been more to the story. More about the friction between the different races that inhabited South Africa. Then it turned into a To Kill a Mockingbird type thing, with the trial and everything. While I found the writing to be good, I thought it was kind of boring. And there must have been some translation problems because somethings just didn't make sense. But all in all, it was a good book. I don't plan on re-reading it ever, but it was still okay. I didn't love it, I didn't hate it. I just liked it.

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Beautiful Book

Cry Beloved Country is a beautiful , lyrical book. Paton has an interesting writting style which adds to the poetry of the novel.Stephen Kumalo, a Angelican priest of Zulu ethnicity is the parson of a native African congregation. He lives in the countryside which is suffering from drought and erosion of the soil. He journeys to the city to seek his sister and his son. Kumalo is a good man. There is a tragedy ,but also inspirational actions. There is nothing sugary sweet about this story.The ending is upbeat and demonstrates the goodness of people.

Great Simplicity; Great Depth; Remarkable Humanity

Many friends recommended CRY, THE BELOVED COUNTRY to me over the years, but it was not until May of this year that the book came my way in the form a gift. I picked it up one evening and--much to my own amazement--read it in a single sitting. Yes, it really is that good.

Published in 1948, the book tells a simple story. Zulu-born Stephen Kumalo is the elderly Christian priest of a tiny church who has seldom set foot outside his rural South Africa village; he is both uncertain and frightened when he summoned to Johannesburg to attend his sister, who is in great crisis. Once in the city, however, he determines to locate his son Absalom, who also lives in Johannesburg and from whom he has received no news for quite some time. Kumalo conducts his search with a mounting sense of despair--and ultimately finds himself in the midst of both personal tragedy and public scandal.

Although the story is grim, the novel itself is not. Alan Payton (1903-1988) wrote several novels, but CRY, THE BELOVED COUNTRY is best-known and most widely read work, and much of its power rests on the remarkable way in which he styles his prose: it possesses a shining simplicity that not only seems to capture the vocal cadence of South Africa but also allows the reader to see through the novel's several levels with a remarkable sense of clarity.

Much of the novel's power resides in its portrait of South Africa in this particular era. The word "apartheid" had not attained its full implication in 1948, but Paton not only identifies the almost accidental seeds of apartheid, he forecasts the ultimate result as well. Paton also endows the novel with a very clear idea of what Christianity should be in actual practice as opposed to what it too often is in actual fact, and although the story is indeed dark, the humanity involved is such that one never feels the darkness cannot be dispelled.

The older I become, the less inclined I am to keep books; these days I read them and give them away, and new permanent additions to my library are rare. But CRY, THE BELOVED COUNTRY is a keeper, a book I've no doubt I'll return to again and again.

GFT, Amazon Reviewer
With Thanks to Kate, Whose Gift This Book Was

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reviews: 1, page 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11

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