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1.)What is an initiation story?/>
- the process of growing-up,
- different stages
- from childhood to adulthood
- usually from inexperience to experience
- individual events, experiences play an important role
2.) narrator/ setting /action
- - from Marnus Erasmus' point of view, not always a reliable narrator
- first person narrative interweaving two plots on different time levels + stages in Marnus' life
- at the age of 11 (St. James, suburb of Cape Town, 1973)
- at the age of 26 (lieutenant in South African army, guerrilla war)
3) list of characters in the novel
Blacks: Gloria (servant of Frikkie's family)
Doreen (servant of Marnus' family)
Chrisjan (former gardener of Marnus' family)
Little Neville (Doreen's son, burned by Whites)
Jan Bandjes (fisherman)
Whites: Marnus Erasmus (main character)
Ilse Erasmus (Marnus' sister)
General Erasmus & wife Leonore (Marnus' parents)
The General (a friend of Mr. Erasmus, a visitor)
Zelda Kemp (a little girl who lives in a black area)
Tannie Karla ( Leonore's sister, conflict, no contact, liberal)
4. Topics:
Problems of growing-up
Violence, aggressions and war
Aspects of racial discrimination
A young person's experience of apartheid
Problems of family, relationships
5. Crucial events in the story:
- arrival of the general
- Frikkie and Marnus become blood brothers
- Marnus' doesn't fullfill his fathers expectations when they go fishing
- Little Neville is missing,
- M. meets Chrisjan who became a beggar
- Frikkie is raped by Marnus' father
- Family visits Little-Neville in hospital
- Family goes on holidays, Marnus seems to be ok again
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