POTGIETER-MA-TR02-81.pdf

indringer deur ’n onbekende landskap met ’n inheemse gids (Ashcroft et al., 1989:28), word in
Duiwelskloof omgekeer en gekompliseer as Flip Lochner, wat met sy wêreldse kennis die
ongetemde kloof inreis en deur die magiese landskap “gekoloniseer” word.
Bo en behalwe tematiese ooreenkomste is daar ook sekere ander terugkerende aspekte
binne die postkoloniale literatuur, soos die kenmerkende gebruik van allegorie (Slemon, 1986;
1987), ironie (New, 1975), magiese realisme (Dash, 1973; Slemon, 1988) en onderbroke
narratiewe strukture. Dit is opvallend dat al hierdie elemente ook deur die postmodernisme
geïmplementeer word. Volgens Hutcheon (1995:131) is die magiese realisme ’n uitstekende
voorbeeld hiervan:
The formal technique of “magic realism” (with its characteristic mixing of the
fantastic and the realist) has been singled out by many critics as one of the points of
conjunction of post-modernism and post-colonialism. Its challenges to genre
distinctions and to the conventions of realism are certainly part of the project of
both enterprises.
In Callaloo (1998:509) vergelyk Rowell die magies-realistiese narratiewe tegniek in Astrid
Roemer se tekste met die van Toni Morrison, terwyl Sarah Nuttal en Carli Coetzee die volgende
opmerk oor Brink se jongste romans:
[They] have taken a more explicit turn towards narrativizing the past. In Brink the
lacunae in the archives are most usefully filled through magical realism, metaphor,
and fantasy, modes that allow for a greater degree of affective symbolic
interpretation in the ways in which the past can be remembered and used (1998:3).
Ashcroft et al. (1989:34) toon ook die volgende aan: “In much European thinking, history and
ancestry, the past forms a powerful reference point for epistemology. In post-colonial thought,
however, as the Australian poet Les Murray has said ‘time broadens into space’ (Murray, 1969)”.
Hulle gaan voort deur te sê dat heelwat skrywers doelbewus Europese begrippe soos geskiedenis
asook die ordening van tyd probeer ondermyn:
[They] run European history aground in a new and overwhelming space which
annihilates time and imperial purpose. Received history is tampered with, rewritten,
and realigned from the point of view of the victims of its destructive progress. ... In
all these texts the perspective changes to that of the ‘Other’ (Ashcroft et al.,
1989:34).
Hierdie ondersoek volstaan dus met die gevolgtrekking dat beide binne die postmodernisme en
die postkolonialisme gewaak moet word teen die universaliserende uitwerking van teorie. Hier
word dus, soos reeds in die inleiding voorlopig aangedui word, uitgegaan van die standpunt dat
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