African Violet

Nothing is what it seems to be

The Caine prize, first set up in 2000 at the Zimbabwe International Book Fair 2000 in Harare, and the 2001 Prize at the Nairobi Book Fair in September 2001 (the Caine prize for African writers, n.d), has given great recognition to African writing, making its richness and diversity worth of attention, by bringing it a wide audience. “This prize is open to writers from anywhere in Africa for work published in English. It focus on the short story, reflecting the contemporary development of the African story-telling tradition” (n.d) which can help the reader not know exactly what to expect, but realize that the quality of the stories will be strongly linked with African culture. African violet and other stories, the Caine prize for African writing 2012, contains “a collection of 15 short stories by African writers, including the 5 stories shortlisted for the Caine Prize 2012” (travel with intent, n.d). It is the story by one of the runner-ups the one that gives the book its title and this same short story we will analyze to study the elements that make a short story and decide, at the end, what is the main theme of it.

In African Violet by Rehana Rossouw we have Lerato, a woman in her late twenties, narrating the story of her new life in her own house with her new and peculiar neighbor. Lerato is both the narrator of the story and the main character. She is a successful lawyer who is beginning a new phase of her life and she does not have a lot of time to visit her friends. Hence, her only company when she feels alone or needed to celebrate something, is her neighbor Dorothy; she is a strange but also friendly woman in her late forties or early fifteens who is annoying Lerato, almost all the time. She seems to be very afraid about being stolen, cheated or pursued, to the point of never going out and having cameras to spy her neighbors. Through Lerato’s description of her actions we can assume she feels lonely and concerned about the outside and its demons. Her actions cannot be called madness, but very close. Lerato’s grandmother (Gogo) seems to be the most important person in Lerato’s life even after her death, we are told she was a very lovely and kind woman with other people. Lerato’s thoughts about her grandma and her affinity for social networks and technology can assure that she felt starved for communication and company. Briefly, other minor character that create an impact in Lerato’s story is Emmanuel, the watchman, a kind man who has worked almost his entire life in Lerato’s complex.

Towards the end of the story we perceive a change both in Lerato and Dorothy. The last one seems more stressed, paranoid and very cautious with her computer (which is her proudest possession) and Loreto assumes that Dorothy has ended up becoming insane but then, after she talks to Emmanuel and makes some analysis and researches, Lerato finds out the reasons why Dorothy behaves in such as strange way. Her guilt of being injustice about Dorothy’s situation seems to weigh heavily on her, even if not consciously. Lerato also feels concerned of what her grandma could think about that situation, she worries of disappointing her because of being a bab person. Thus, she sends a gif to Dorothy expecting to be forgiven. The most representative character to Leorato is a big mystery as well: Gogo who took care her when her mother died; all along the story we are told that Gogo was and is still the most important person for Lerato, nevertheless we do not exactly what kind of kinship they really had.

It is not difficult to tell in which time the story takes place, if we take into consideration that are many references to the use of technology that are presented nowadays. The narrator tells us: “On the trestle is an iMac pro, with a 27-inch screen and wireless keyboard” (p. 205) which belongs to a line of computers manufactured by apple that was formally announced on 2006 and the last model released on 2013 (apple-history/mac pro, n.d ). Thus, the time frame is more defined. The atmosphere is relaxed and homey due to Lerato telling the story in her mind as a monologue. The scenes take place at times in Loreto’s house, at other times at Dorothy’s house. The social changes that have happened around Loreto also become palpable when she mentions that her new house is perfect “a world away from the Soweto Street” where she grew up and where “fences were low enough for everyone’s business to climb over”(p,203) . Taking us to a somewhat recent past where Soweto was a dangerous place where violence, crime, terrorism, ripe among other social pathologies were part of daily life. One of the most powerful clues as to when this woman is living is her use of social networks as the famous Facebook and also Dorothy’s use of online markets to order everything. Such as usages of internet became strongest after middle of 2010 decade, which reassures the time of the story as around final of 2010 decade or beginning of 2020 decade.

The irony in this story is not presented in several levels. We cannot find examples of verbal irony. Nevertheless, there are some examples of irony of situation, one of these is the fact Dorothy wears as a child and

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