De/Re-Constructing Borders - University of Minnesota
De/Re-Constructing Borders - University of Minnesota
De/Re-Constructing Borders - University of Minnesota
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<strong>De</strong>/<strong>Re</strong>-<strong>Constructing</strong> <strong>Borders</strong>: Afrikaner Language, Mythology and Nostalgia in the<br />
New South Africa’s Drama<br />
Megan Lewis<br />
<strong>University</strong> <strong>of</strong> <strong>Minnesota</strong>, <strong>De</strong>pt. <strong>of</strong> Theatre Arts & Dance<br />
They say there is no place in the universe where one can stand back far enough so<br />
that one can tell one’s story and in the telling can say: here is the truth, exactly as<br />
it happened....a story is always burdened by all the pieces that are lied and<br />
dreamed onto it, and is disfigured by all that is forgotten. But like a child after<br />
nine months in the pregnant belly, disfigured or not, if he wants out, then he must<br />
out. And where was there ever a birthing without a groaning? And without<br />
blood? Yes, blood, because the soul can also bleed...in its own way (3). 1<br />
So <strong>De</strong>on Opperman 2 births the story <strong>of</strong> the Afrikaner in his epic history play in<br />
Afrikaans, Donkerland, or Dark Land, which received a national audience at the<br />
Grahamstown Festival last July and has been heralded as a watershed in South African<br />
drama, an incisive investigation <strong>of</strong> Afrikanerdom. 3 That this play emerged at a time <strong>of</strong><br />
great social upheaval is indicative <strong>of</strong> a desire to assert a national discourse in a time <strong>of</strong><br />
fragmented national narratives. I aim to explore the fragmentation <strong>of</strong> the social fabric in<br />
the New South Africa and to investigate what a play in Afrikaans, about Afrikaner history,<br />
staged at a principally anglophone festival, says about this new social landscape. I am<br />
interested in how Afrikaners, like those staged in Opperman’s play, who have for so long<br />
played the role <strong>of</strong> power architects, must now re-stage themselves differently. I then ask, is<br />
this staging really that different?<br />
The Grahamstown Festival <strong>of</strong>fers an annual showcase <strong>of</strong> amateur, pr<strong>of</strong>essional,<br />
regional, and national theatre. This event is an aperture through which to view the current<br />
trends and newest plays from around the nation. During its 23 years <strong>of</strong> existence, the<br />
Festival has mirrored the social field, reflected the social issues. It was established as a<br />
Shakespeare festival in response to what was perceived as “the onslaught <strong>of</strong> Afrikaner<br />
nationalism.” 4 That a nationalistic Afrikaans play has entered the realm that once<br />
shunned Afrikaner nationalism is quite remarkable. 5<br />
Donkerland received an audience at a time when the euphoria <strong>of</strong> the post-election<br />
period had subsided, as violence mounted, and as the minute struggles <strong>of</strong> daily life became<br />
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tangibly strained. F.W. de Klerk resigned as <strong>De</strong>puty President in June <strong>of</strong> 1996, just before<br />
the play opened in Grahamstown. <strong>De</strong> Klerk’s resignation signaled a definitive shift in<br />
political power that was no longer disputable, particularly among staunch Afrikaners. In<br />
addition, the “New South Africa” is comprised <strong>of</strong> an open field <strong>of</strong> varied forces who now (at<br />
least legally) enjoy the same rights and privileges. However, it is still a place <strong>of</strong> enormous<br />
tension, <strong>of</strong> struggles that happen on a daily basis between individuals fighting for their<br />
economic and social livelihoods.<br />
Set against the context <strong>of</strong> the new government, Opperman’s play chronicles the life <strong>of</strong><br />
one family: the de Witt’s (literally, “the Whites”), owners <strong>of</strong> a farm named Donkerland. An<br />
epic history play, Donkerland spans three centuries: from the moment the patriarch stakes<br />
his claim on the land at the tip <strong>of</strong> the African continent; through the struggles to keep the<br />
farm and the hardships <strong>of</strong> frontier life in the 19th century; to the nation-building <strong>of</strong> the<br />
early 20th century; the height and subsequent fall <strong>of</strong> apartheid; and finally, to the present,<br />
when Donkerland is redistributed to its Zulu heirs under the Land <strong>Re</strong>appropriation<br />
Commission <strong>of</strong> Mandela’s new government.<br />
Opperman establishes the complexities <strong>of</strong> the Afrikaner in the opening monologue <strong>of</strong><br />
his play, quoted above. His task is riddled with tensions. The search for Truth, Opperman<br />
recognizes, is not possible. He acknowledges the lies and dreams <strong>of</strong> the past.<br />
Afrikanerdom is trapped within the boundaries <strong>of</strong> its own formation and––as Opperman<br />
dares to assert––also dreams <strong>of</strong> being free <strong>of</strong> those fetters.<br />
The play is five and a half hours long and was staged in two parts with a dinner<br />
break in between. Opperman selects the most common “signposts” <strong>of</strong> Afrikaner history,<br />
the key events that punctuate the 300 years <strong>of</strong> their existence in southern Africa. He<br />
captures the mythology and history’s reverberations through the de Witt family’s actions<br />
and reactions to these events. In this way, he views the political through a personal lens.<br />
Early in Opperman’s play, land––complete with all its associations <strong>of</strong> ownership<br />
and superiority––is established as a central myth <strong>of</strong> Afrikaner culture. It is important to<br />
remember that central to the Afrikaners’ sense <strong>of</strong> identity is the myth <strong>of</strong> being the Chosen<br />
People, favored by God to inhabit and dominate the Promised Land at the southern tip <strong>of</strong><br />
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Africa, to bring civilization to a dark and unruly world. This civilization is a patriarchal,<br />
heavily Calvinist, racist one. With God on their side, the early Dutch and French settlers<br />
claimed the land as their own and land became an essential part <strong>of</strong> their cultural identity.<br />
By focusing on this central element <strong>of</strong> Afrikaner mythology, Opperman calls attention to<br />
the colonial legacy <strong>of</strong> his people. 6 The play echoes with land references: in its title; in the<br />
site <strong>of</strong> the play; and its the constant battles by each <strong>of</strong> the characters to claim or detach<br />
themselves from it.<br />
The play begins as the patriarch, Pieter de Witt, plants his land claim marker in the<br />
mid 18th century; it ends with the contemporary Land <strong>Re</strong>appropriation Act. As Pieter<br />
claims Donkerland, he sets into motion the long struggle that characterizes the narrative <strong>of</strong><br />
Afrikaner history and becomes the subject <strong>of</strong> this play. In Scene Two, Pieter marries<br />
Magriet and the couple establish themselves on Donkerland in a spartan cottage furnished<br />
with the familiar trappings <strong>of</strong> Voortrekker, or pioneer, life: a limestone fireplace,<br />
springbok-skin floor mats, a musket, and strips <strong>of</strong> dried beef biltong hanging along the<br />
ceiling. Called away to fight the Zulus, Pieter leaves his pregnant wife at the homestead,<br />
under the care <strong>of</strong> his Zulu maid and sexual consort, Meidjie. Rivalry between white<br />
mistress and black servant, between sexual competitors for the same man, predominates<br />
the scene. Magriet feels alienated when her husband speaks to Meidjie in Zulu. She<br />
demands that he not do this and requires that Meidjie learn to speak Afrikaans. Before<br />
leaving, Pieter gathers the women around the table and <strong>of</strong>fers a farewell prayer from the<br />
oversized family Bible. Then he kisses his unborn child in Magriet’s belly and says, “My<br />
son...Jacob de Witt...after his grandfather ” (25).<br />
During his absence, Magriet goes into labor but the baby is breached. A neighbor<br />
woman attempts to help her behind an ox skin that separates the bedroom upstage, while<br />
Meidjie frantically carries buckets <strong>of</strong> water to aid her. Meidjie tries repeatedly to tell the<br />
white woman––in Zulu, in broken Afrikaans, with gestures––that she knows how to turn<br />
the baby but the neighbor barks back at her, “Stand back! Don’t you dare try your<br />
barbarian practices on her....This isn’t your kaffir kraal; this is a white man’s house!” (31).<br />
Pieter arrives as his wife is dying, and under Meidjie’s guidance, tries to save her. In the<br />
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play’s most melodramatic stage moment, Pieter uses his hunting knife to perform a<br />
cesarean on his dead wife’s body. He pulls the male child from her belly and lifts him into<br />
a bright red wash <strong>of</strong> light as a chorus <strong>of</strong> Zulu singers chant faster and faster to a climax.<br />
This scene resonates with many elements <strong>of</strong> Afrikanerdom: the inheritance <strong>of</strong> a<br />
racist history; an established and revered patriarchy; the secret legacy <strong>of</strong> miscegenation;<br />
the woman’s role as engenderess <strong>of</strong> the Volk, or people; the mythology <strong>of</strong> being the Chosen<br />
Ones; and the symbolic capital <strong>of</strong> springbok skins, biltong, and Voortrekker heroes. The<br />
baby Jacob is described as “being plucked out <strong>of</strong> a swamp” (34). That swamp is his<br />
mother’s body, which is presented as a place where male identity is engendered, like the<br />
farm itself that is inseparable from Afrikaner identity.<br />
This tie to the land is developed––and fractured–– later in the play when Mariaan,<br />
the free-spirited and academic-minded daughter, flies the coup for America. She cuts her<br />
traditional ties as reproducer <strong>of</strong> Afrikanerdom by not staying close to home and having<br />
children. Instead, she pursues a life <strong>of</strong> the mind, a revolutionary act for a de-Witt (read<br />
Afrikaner) woman. This feeling <strong>of</strong> self-exile, <strong>of</strong> seeking “some other place” is a phrase<br />
Opperman repeats over and over throughout the play.<br />
In Part II in the vignette entitled The Salve <strong>of</strong> Self Glue, Opperman explores the rise<br />
<strong>of</strong> the <strong>of</strong>ficial Afrikaner Nationalist Movement and the victory <strong>of</strong> the Nationalist Party in<br />
1948 (in other words, the beginnings <strong>of</strong> apartheid). The desire to leave, to break free, is<br />
clearly becoming a tension amongst Afrikaners at the time when their political power is<br />
expanding. The tensions <strong>of</strong> the social field are manifested through two brothers, one <strong>of</strong><br />
whom has stayed on to farm Donkerland, and the other, who has left to seek his fortune in<br />
the city. 7 Ouboet, a Nationalist supporter, has maintained the farm and is the only male<br />
left on Donkerland. His younger brother, Dirk, holds very different political views. He<br />
returns to claim his half <strong>of</strong> his inheritance after a twenty year absence during which he has<br />
been a teacher in a black school. The intense battle over land and inheritance between<br />
these two brothers, who literally stand on opposite sides <strong>of</strong> a fence as they speak their<br />
lines, is indicative <strong>of</strong> the split or rift that politics cause in South Africa and the battle<br />
amongst Afrikaners over who has the right to the land (read here the right to be an<br />
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Afrikaner). The border that stands between brothers, Dirk and Ouboet, is clearly seen in<br />
this exchange about Dirk’s teaching at a black school and their different notions <strong>of</strong> race:<br />
OUBOET: ‘n Onderwyser?! [A Teacher?! So, you’re a master now.]<br />
DIRK: Mnumzana. [isiZulu for teacher.]<br />
OUBOET: Mnumzana?<br />
DIRK: I taught black children.<br />
OUBOET: ‘n Kaffer skool? [A kaffir school?!]<br />
DIRK: A school, Brother, for children.<br />
OUBOET: Kafferkinders. [Kaffir children.]<br />
DIRK: Kinders.<br />
OUBOET: Kafferkinders (116).<br />
In tangible ways, and at the very site <strong>of</strong> language and communication, the political<br />
tensions <strong>of</strong> apartheid during the 1970’s and 80’s manifested themselves on the bodies <strong>of</strong><br />
the Afrikaner people. The once unified “nation” is beginning to disintegrate and<br />
Opperman, having established the system in his play, starts to highlight the cracks in its<br />
armor.<br />
At the closing <strong>of</strong> the play, Opperman quotes a verse from renowned Afrikaans poet<br />
and playwright, N.P. Van Wyk Louw, who reminds us that “this land was not purchased/<br />
merely on loan” (129). The notion <strong>of</strong> borrowed land, and borrowed time, is especially<br />
poignant in contemporary South Africa. Nelson Mandela lived on borrowed time for 27<br />
years while imprisoned on Robben Island. The time has now come for the Afrikaner to pay<br />
up, and payment is taking effect at the very site <strong>of</strong> identity: land. Under the recent Land<br />
Commission, properties that originally belonged to indigenous tribes are now being<br />
redistributed to their original owners. Afrikaner farmers, who have worked the land for six<br />
generations, are being required to sell their farms to the government for reappropriation. 8<br />
Opperman leaves the Afrikaner at this moment <strong>of</strong> landlessness and uncertainty. As<br />
we see the image <strong>of</strong> Arnold, forlornly staring at a pile <strong>of</strong> stones on the edge <strong>of</strong> Donkerland<br />
where Pieter de Witt the patriarch first planted his marker over 300 years before, we hear<br />
the female narrator’s final speech:<br />
... while [Arnold] sat there, a snail slithered across a stone and left a little trail...a<br />
short hyphen <strong>of</strong> silver in the mighty wilderness; and then it hit him: we...we are<br />
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only here momentarily. The wheels <strong>of</strong> Africa turn slowly...slowly, but as surely as<br />
death, and one day...someday only a disintegrated little pile <strong>of</strong> stones will<br />
survive, as witness to the little hyphen <strong>of</strong> humanity, lost in the grass <strong>of</strong><br />
Donkerland (157).<br />
Having established the pathway to Afrikaner identity, by retelling the familiar<br />
stories and reflecting the Afrikaner Self on stage, Opperman then poses the troubling and<br />
dangerous question: Now what? and places the responsibility for answering it in the hands<br />
<strong>of</strong> the audience: the Afrikaners <strong>of</strong> today. The tiny trace <strong>of</strong> vanishing, white humanity has<br />
seen its day. Snails hide in their shells, and many Afrikaners refuse to envision any future<br />
other than the past they’ve known. Opperman warns his fellow Afrikaners not to hide in<br />
their shells or all that will remain is an insignificant trace <strong>of</strong> white in a dark, donker, land.<br />
Donkerland purports to be a play about the fleeting position <strong>of</strong> Afrikaners in the<br />
Dark Land <strong>of</strong> Africa. Yet while it explores the notion that the Afrikaner’s time has run<br />
out––that his hyphen come to an end––in re-enacting his history in an epic play <strong>of</strong> 5 1/2<br />
hours, it also re-anchors that history. The play conceals its own history-production as it<br />
foregrounds history. To use Pierre Bourdieu’s terms, Opperman is (re)circulating symbolic<br />
capital (that which is material but is not recognized as such) that for so long has formed<br />
the sense <strong>of</strong> Afrikaner history, truth, and nationalism.<br />
In the traditionally anglophone city <strong>of</strong> Grahamstown, Opperman’s play represents<br />
both a crossing point and a line drawn in the sand. The play enters the English-speaking<br />
world <strong>of</strong> Grahamstown, and explores the boundaries <strong>of</strong> what it means and has meant to be<br />
Afrikaners, and what the future for Afrikaners will be in the New South Africa; as well, by<br />
presenting itself in Afrikaans, it delimits the borders that exist between English- and<br />
Afrikaans-speakers. Within a world where the highly visible, surface borders <strong>of</strong> apartheid<br />
have been dismantled, the subtler, invisible borders <strong>of</strong> nationhood are asserted through<br />
the popular medium <strong>of</strong> theatre and, particularly, through language.<br />
Formerly seen as a language associated with the apartheid regime, Afrikaans is now<br />
seeking to disentangle itself from those negative associations and make its mark on the<br />
new terrain as an autonomous and valid form <strong>of</strong> utterance. In a country with eleven <strong>of</strong>ficial<br />
languages, this play reasserts Afrikaans as a language and an ideology. Using the<br />
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engaging expressiveness <strong>of</strong> theatre, at the country’s most heavily and widely-attended<br />
theatrical venue, Opperman ensures that Afrikaner (nationalistic) interests are being<br />
articulated publicly and in a format that both exposes and shields their political<br />
implications. The play foregrounds politics in its subject matter but also obscures the<br />
political agenda <strong>of</strong> the play: to re-articulate Afrikaner interests at a time when Afrikaner<br />
power is in question.<br />
So, does this drama do justice to the complex and dislocated field <strong>of</strong> the New South<br />
Africa, or does it essentially serve a regressive notion <strong>of</strong> identity as an act <strong>of</strong> nostalgia? On<br />
the textual level, Opperman tackles the multiplicities that comprise Afrikanerdom. He<br />
dares to ask difficult and painful questions <strong>of</strong> Afrikaners at the exact moment in which<br />
they are adjusting to a newly-mapped social field in which they no longer wield power. He<br />
interrogates the colonial legacy <strong>of</strong> whites in South Africa by so faithfully representing the<br />
past on stage and by pointing to its problems. But on the metatextual level, his play is<br />
symptomatic <strong>of</strong> the state <strong>of</strong> South Africa after apartheid. It emerged from the anxiety that<br />
comes from political and social transition. As well, it is prescriptive: it forces those who<br />
see it to ask that “What Now?” question. But in the context <strong>of</strong> a resurgence <strong>of</strong> Boer culture,<br />
this play is not merely an innocent re-telling <strong>of</strong> history. The recent proliferation <strong>of</strong><br />
nationalist groups such as the Boer Journalist Society that was recently announced, the<br />
internet-happy Boer People’s <strong>Re</strong>public, smaller right-wing movements such as the <strong>Re</strong>-<br />
erected Nationalist Party <strong>of</strong> South Africa, or more powerful and well-known groups such as<br />
the Afrikaner <strong>Re</strong>sistance Movement, indicate a strong sense <strong>of</strong> nostalgia and a desire to<br />
re-create the mythology <strong>of</strong> the past, to re-member or re-assemble, a sense <strong>of</strong> community<br />
amongst Afrikaners. Such movements are <strong>of</strong>ten fraught with notions <strong>of</strong> racial supremacy,<br />
legitimacy to the land, and patriarchal dominance.<br />
My critique <strong>of</strong> Opperman’s project in no way denies his contribution to “New<br />
Afrikanerdom,” nor does it ignore his courage to question so rigid an identity in a public<br />
manner. But that he writes a play in Afrikaans, about so Afrikaans a subject, at a time<br />
when the Afrikaner no longer holds political power is indicative <strong>of</strong> a need among New<br />
Afrikaners to find their niche in this Bhabha-esque nation <strong>of</strong> many narratives.<br />
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Situated as it is in Grahamstown and in the recent political climate, Donkerland,<br />
ends up doing more to avow than to dismantle notions <strong>of</strong> Afrikaner identity. The<br />
audience’s reaction was one <strong>of</strong> identification, <strong>of</strong> solidarity-building. The play functioned as<br />
an act <strong>of</strong> re-iteration, a labor <strong>of</strong> re-telling, <strong>of</strong> re-enacting a cultural identity that seeks<br />
affirmation in a political and social climate in which its existence is tenuous. Within the<br />
text itself, the colonial past is problematized––it explores the schisms that exist within<br />
Afrikaner families and political bodies; it questions the assumptions held by the majority<br />
<strong>of</strong> Afrikaners about their legitimacy and what makes them a people; and it posits a<br />
dubious and tenuous future for the Afrikaner. Yet in its mode <strong>of</strong> delivery, a mode that<br />
pulls at the heart-strings with its heroic and epic scope, and is so naturalistic that it<br />
seems as if the audience is watching their own families on the stage, it encourages<br />
audience identification with the all-too-familiar images <strong>of</strong> themselves, essentially re-<br />
iterating an Afrikaner identity. Staged within the tenuous field <strong>of</strong> the New South Africa,<br />
this play’s existence asserts a strong sense <strong>of</strong> Afrikaner pride even if the textual battle<br />
within it attempts to interrogate Afrikanerdom and highlight its shame. Opperman<br />
embraces his past and puts on stage characters that are as much Afrikaners as those in<br />
the audience: he literally ‘re-members’ them, gives them substance. He tries to fathom how<br />
they have had to change and adapt to the ever-changing environment around them. But he<br />
does not forget them, for to do so would be to do the impossible: to accept the fate <strong>of</strong> that<br />
little hyphen <strong>of</strong> silvery slime in the darkness <strong>of</strong> Africa. As the Afrikaans theatre world’s<br />
favorite and most prolific playwright in contemporary South Africa, Opperman cannot, and<br />
will not, do that.<br />
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BIBLIOGRAPHY<br />
1. McNeil, Donald G. Jr. “With Apartheid Done For, What’s a Festival to Do?” New York<br />
Times International: Tuesday, July 16, 1996.<br />
2. Opperman, <strong>De</strong>on. Donkerland. Cape Town: Tafelberg, 1996.<br />
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NOTES<br />
1 All textual references are from <strong>De</strong>on Opperman’s Donkerland. (Cape Town:<br />
Tafelberg, 1996). All translations are my own.<br />
2 <strong>De</strong>on Opperman is one <strong>of</strong> the popular contemporary playwrights writing in Afrikaans.<br />
Educated at Rhodes and Northwestern Universities, he is as prolific as he is<br />
controversial. His other plays span every genre and have exposed South African<br />
audiences to the taboo subjects <strong>of</strong> HIV and AIDS, right-wingers and racism, the<br />
trauma <strong>of</strong> the Border Wars and teenage conscription, and most recently,<br />
homosexuality. Of all his plays, Donkerland received the highest praise and marked<br />
him as an Afrikaans dramatician <strong>of</strong> the utmost caliber.<br />
3 Donkerland premiered at the Afrikaans-speaking Klein Karoo Festival in Oudtshoorn,<br />
South Africa, in April, 1996. Thereafter, it received a national audience at the<br />
Standard Bank National Arts Festival in Grahamstown in July, followed by a 3-week<br />
engagement at the State Theater in Pretoria. The play was written and directed by<br />
<strong>De</strong>on Opperman with a star-studded cast <strong>of</strong> South Africa’s most accomplished actors.<br />
The production was presented in two parts, each <strong>of</strong> two and a half hours in duration,<br />
with a dinner break in between.<br />
4 Donald G. McNeil, Jr. “With Apartheid Done For, What’s a Festival to Do?” New<br />
York Times International: Tuesday, July 16, 1996.<br />
5 The term ‘nationalistic’ suggests those activities that a nation engages in to forward its<br />
interests. In this case, the ‘nation’ I refer to are white, Afrikaans-speaking South<br />
Africans known as ‘Afrikaners.’ Afrikaner nationalistic behavior and thought implies<br />
the common national sentiment associated with a group rather than the political or<br />
geographic entity itself. Afrikaner nationalism, on the other hand, refers more directly<br />
to the political activities that lead to, and upheld, apartheid and is strongly connected<br />
to the National Party and its activities. Thus, I consider Opperman’s play a<br />
nationalistic act, in that it is aimed at and serves the Afrikaner sense <strong>of</strong> nationhood;<br />
in contrast, the Grahamstown Festival was created out <strong>of</strong> a political climate <strong>of</strong><br />
overwhelming Afrikaner nationalism.<br />
6 South Africa’s colonial history is multilayered. Briefly, Dutch and French settlers<br />
colonized the indigenous peoples <strong>of</strong> the region (Xhosa, Zulu, Griqua, San and Khoi<br />
Khoi) in the 17th century. Seeing a favorable economic opportunity, the British<br />
followed soon after. The longtime tensions between the Boers and the English came to<br />
a head in the Anglo-Boer War (1899-1902). Suffering a huge defeat, the Boers set<br />
about a project <strong>of</strong> nation-building that lead in 1938 to the formation <strong>of</strong> an Afrikaner<br />
national identity and in 1949 to the victory <strong>of</strong> the National Party and the beginning <strong>of</strong><br />
apartheid. After prolonged political struggles lasting decades, South Africa ended its<br />
battle with England by claiming its independence and becoming a <strong>Re</strong>public in 1961.<br />
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7 The discovery <strong>of</strong> diamonds and gold in the 1880’s, and the subsequent explosive<br />
growth <strong>of</strong> cities like Johannesburg, caused a schism amongst Afrikaners<br />
between those who remained farmers and those who broke family tradition to<br />
seek their fortunes in the city.<br />
8 In his use <strong>of</strong> the Land Commission, Opperman is actually establishing a threat which,<br />
in reality, is not that pressing. Currently, the Commission is completely swamped<br />
with requests and, in light <strong>of</strong> the Truth and <strong>Re</strong>conciliation Commission, has been<br />
placed on the back burner at this moment in time. The first <strong>of</strong> thousands <strong>of</strong> cases was<br />
just recently tried and the <strong>of</strong>ficial estimates are that the Land Commission will be<br />
busy with its task deep into the next century. Thus, Opperman’s use <strong>of</strong> this<br />
institution as a metaphor for the fear within the Afrikaner community <strong>of</strong> losing<br />
identity and land is as a symbolic and dramatic effect that ups the stakes for the<br />
play’s characters and its audiences, rather than an actual social event at this point in<br />
the transition process in South Africa.<br />
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