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Alex La Guma's The Lemon Orchard Essay

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Stable Meaning, the Perversion of Nature, and Discursive Communities in Alex La Guma's "The Lemon Orchard"

South African writer Alex La Guma was an active member of his country's non-white liberation movement. One of the 156 people accused in the Treason Trial of 1956, La Guma wrote his first book, A Walk in the Night and Other Stories, in 1962 (Wade 15). "The Lemon Orchard," a story which appeared in this debut work, is a gripping piece about the horror and cruelty of racism. In the story, La Guma describes in chilling detail how a black teacher (who had sought legal redress for being beaten up by his principal and church minister) is roused from his sleep and led to a lemon orchard by four white men for whipping. At the beginning …show more content…

Given that La Guma has painstakingly built up readers' expectations of the looming violence, why does he conclude his story without narrating the black teacher's beating? In addition, Nature is described as having made a paradoxical U-turn from its initial position condemning racism. Given his anti-racist stance, La Guma evidently does not support whites beating up blacks. With his depiction of Nature supporting racism, La Guma risks confusing readers and weakening the anti-racism message he is presumably trying to send, since people may actually misinterpret him and think that he sanctions racism. Why then does he choose to portray Nature as condoning, even anticipating the violence to be meted out?

Understanding the reason for the story's incompleteness and Nature's perversion will allow readers to better comprehend the story and decipher the message that La Guma is trying to send (namely, the fact that racism should be condemned). In this paper, I will argue that there is no need for La Guma to describe the beating (hence the story's incompleteness) since he has produced a stable story, and because he wants readers to imagine the approaching violence themselves. Subsequently, I will explore La Guma's depiction of Nature and show that his portrayal of Nature's perversion contributes to the story's stability by reinforcing his message that racism should be condemned.
Finally, I will look at Linda

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