In a romantic novel about emancipation, Philida, the late André Brink failed to get to the heart of his main character’s pain, writes Jane Rosenthal.
Philida is a charming and easy read; a romantic novel about a slave woman, it is set at the time of the emancipation of all slaves in the Cape Colony in 1834. Unfortunately, it was not too carefully finished off. Brink had long been familiar with the slave history of the Cape Colony – see his novels such as A Chain of Voices (1982) – and in his acknowledgements he gave an excellent set of references that would be well worth following up, indicating that he had added fresh research to his extensive experience.
Here we have another in the great tradition of the plaasroman (farm novel), which has such a special place in both English and Afrikaans literature. It is not only Philida’s life that we see, but also the whole farm and the district of Worcester. This dorp had recently been elevated from a coach stop on the way to the Karoo to the seat of the magistracy, which was moved there from Tulbagh.
Brink recreated this era with his old skill undiminished, and with many beautiful passages evoking the natural world and the special flavour of the rich old wine farms. The British had been governing for about three decades and there were many unsettling changes – indentured labourers, dispossessed Khoi and soon-to-be-free slaves could no longer be treated like beasts of burden.
Philida takes advantage of this to report her lover to the magistrate for breach of promise, which is quite startling, I grant you. But in general Philida turns out to be far too romanticised; she may be feisty, often bloody minded, but she is not really traumatised. The stupid cruelties she is subject to, as well as her experience of rape and infanticide, seem to make her no more than defiant.
Why this book should have been long-listed for the 2012 Booker prize may have something to do with the first-mentioned damaging myth (how some Brits love to be horrified by South Africa) and perhaps with the beguiling little cat in this story
Full review by Jane Rosenthal in Mail & Guardian
