Gordimer, Nadine - The Ultimate Safari

Nadine Gordimer - The Ultimate Safari

The Ultimate Safari is a short story= originally published in a collection of 1991, in order to raise money/funds for HIB (meningitis).

At the beginning of the short story there is an advert (=epigraph) of a travel agency (of the western world) =suggest to go to Kruger Park to Africa to have a nice safari---> this epigraph acquires an important meaning: Nadine Gordimer tried to create a contrast between the western and African perspective=safari is something positive from the western perspective, but from the perspective of the natives (in particular the black young girl) is a horrible experience (she understood their perspective).

Setting

Mozambique, during civil war. South Africa was the only nation with a white government---> the surrounding nations had black governments (Marxist), completely different=because of that, South Africa supported the bandits (rebels) in Mozambique-->due to the war people have to leave and to cross Kruger Park.
Kruger Park=positive for the western, but negative for Africans (because it was risky) --> they have to become invisible=like sort of animals (they had to disappear somehow=could not talk to the people-blacks and whites working) ---->Although the girl said her country was a country of people not of animals.

Divided in two parts

1. Civil war, escaping
2. Refugee camp (not escaping, but life is though=they stayed there for more than 2 years: the children could go to school, but adults could not work--->same situation perceived in two different perspectives (grandmother and the child).
Both of them are not ideal situations.

Narrative technique

use of inverted commas to introduce the dialogues (sort of stream of consciousness technique, but sill punctuation-anyway you cannot understand very well when someone is speaking and the other is answering back-).

From the very beginning=we have got the perspective of a black child=in that case Nadine managed to feel the feelings of the weak/ to understand the perspective of the other –it is not easy- (we have to keep in mind that she was white=she is considered to be the best white novelist to show a particular sensitivity towards the blacks)). The white in that short story is cruel, but we understand it at the end.
Description of a journey from Mozambique to a refugee camp: black people are escaping from their village in Mozambique because of the civil war (bandits who destroyed and raid the villages=they actually existed, and were supported by the whites) =people are starving, they do not have food to eat.
From the beginning the narrator (a black girl) tells the reader her parents did not come back- (they died in these attacks, her father died in war) =she and her brother are alone--> they have got just grandparents. The death of her parents is shown in a naive way: the girl does not understand why her parents are not there anymore. For this reason, at the end of the short story she thinks that probably everybody will come back.
Nadine provides us with two different perspectives of the situation: the perspective of the child (having all her life still to live) -->the description makes us understand better these horrible events, because children are innocents.
Nadine’s way of writing results even a stronger emotion, in order to make the reader understand better--> related to the importance of the writer to make the full meaning of something for the reader=that’s Nadine’s aim, and we can understand it very clear.

Language

Simple and short sentences, and repetitions.
In describing the fact her mother did not come back, the girl does not say ‘’she is dead’’, but she tries to give possible explanation for disappearance=she is innocent.

Since their mother did not come back=their grandparents decided to leave, did not know how to go on. They took part to an entire group of people who decided to leave and to go to those refugee camps (in the border) --> in order to reach the camp=they have to cross Kruger Park.
Important: they will be told some rules to follow, when they approach the Kruger Park: they do not have to talk to black people working there, otherwise those will be fired immediately. They can’t absolutely talk to whites working there=the whites did not accept the blacks o non-white (in general those who were not ‘’purely white’’). Even animals, the lions in particular, were depicted as the danger/threat---> basically the refuges had to become invisible, in order to survive (=that is the main rule, if you wanted to survive in Kruger Park).

Articles of the period denouncing the fact that people who walked in Kruger Park, they knew that they were blacks trying to survive and reach the refugee camp, and they knew that they were killed at the end by lions/animals=they did not do anything--> it seems that everything was part of that policy with the objective of destroying a country/democracy they tried to give birth to.
At least 1 million people died during civil war, and many died trying to get to the refugee camp.

Mozambique is described as the country of people not of animals, although there are a lot of animals--> they were supposed to be like animals and to become invisible because of that.

People who decided to live together protected each other: they did not want to be isolated/left alone--> different situations in which is clear that, although they are leaving looking for a better life, they feel as they are a community--> the life of the other is much as important as mine. Infact, when these refugees are surrounded by lions, it is thanks to a sort of guide who knew how to deal with lions that they survived=nobody abandoned anyone, in particular tried to protect the children.

Other perspectives

The grandmother=who lost everything and had any hope left, she knows that for her there will be nothing positive. At the end of the short story: managed to get to that refugee camp--> but we have to think about these camps as something very though were you had to live=not good conditions (left there for a lot of time, all together, nothing more than trying to survive even there).
Perspective of a white woman (journalist)=it is clear that she does not care about the sufferance=she is shallow (whites have denied hope to black people=the answer of the grandmother during the interview: makes you think about that). Although there is a lot of sufferance described, and that the grandmother thinks that for her there is no future--> there is a sort of hope for the children=they approach things from another perspective: they are young and innocent (they think they will come back to Mozambique, and the young girl even thinks her mother will come back).