These notes include a variety of information regarding the themes, key events, character sketches, quotes, full book summary, symbols and their meanings and background behind the novel
How to write a 'Theory of Flight' essay for the IEB English Paper II exam
The Theory of Flight - Quotes Page
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,GENRE
• Magical realism is a genre in which magical, mystical elements are woven into an
apparently realistic story.
• The ‘magical’ is limited to a few instances while ‘realistic’ may be used to describe
the rest of the novel.
(Magical images such as the golden egg, the giant pair of silver wings are
interspersed ed with academic, scientific terms: genealogies, histories,
teleologies, epistemologies, and epidemiologies.)
• The writing style is lyrical, evocative, poetic.
SETTING
• The story is set in an unnamed southern African country.
• Although it is a story about a particular place, it is also a story that can take place
anywhere, which helps us focus more on what the story is about and not so much
on where it is set.
• The things that happen within the story – war, violence, pandemics, love, loss
– are things that are experienced worldwide.
SYNOPSIS
• The Theory of Flight tells the story of a remarkable young woman called Imogen
Zula Nyoni (Genie). Her story is told against the backdrop of the violent transition
from colonialism to independence of an unnamed Southern African nation.
PROLOGUE
• The story begins at the end, with the extraordinary death of the protagonist,
Genie, who is seen to “fly away on a giant pair of silver wings”, leaving behind a
heart that had “calcified into the most precious and beautiful something” the
onlookers had ever seen!
• We are told that this miraculous event, which occurs at the Beauford Farm and
Estate, is the result of a culmination of “genealogies, knowing and dying”
• In this way, the prologue introduces us to a story with multiple themes, all of
which revolve around the twin hearts of this tale:
a country transitioning from colonialism to independence and the life of a young
woman, Genie.
NARRATION
• The third-person omniscient perspective:
The Theory of Flight is told from a third-person omniscient perspective by a
narrator who shifts between the perspectives of various characters.
• This narrative viewpoint offers the reader insight into the internal emotions,
thoughts and reactions of the individual characters.
• Each chapter is focalised by a different character, indicated by the names that
form the chapter headings.
• Each character is provided with a unique voice in the chapters that are focalised
by them.
• The perspectives of Marcus, Vida and Krystle are afforded the most prominence
throughout the novel. It is noteworthy that only three short chapters are focalised
by Genie and her perspective is included in only six other chapters, despite being
the protagonist of the story.
,A NON – LINEAR NARRATIVE
• The narrator does not tell the events and stories chronologically, but rather uses
a non-linear narrative technique, moving back and forth through place and time.
• In this type of narrative, the readers at some point know more about what is
happening, and what will happen next, than the characters. This technique thus
allows opportunity for dramatic irony, in which the readers’ awareness of a
specific situation differs from that of the characters.
• A clear instance of this divergence between the readers’ and the characters’
awareness is that the readers know both how and where Genie dies as these
details are revealed in the first paragraph. The characters in the story, however,
do not know that this will happen.
MULTIPLE PERSPECTIVES
• The story of each part is then told from a variety of perspectives.
• Although focused on Genie, the story is actually focalised through various
characters who include:
- Golide Gumede
- her albino father who is a freedom fighter during the civil war
- Vida de Villiers, also known as Jesus, her Coloured bisexual life-partner who
lives a large part of his life as a street dweller
- Valentine Tanaka, her disabled friend who is a dedicated civil-servant
- Marcus and Krystle, members of the upper middle-class Masuku family that
adopt her and has Dingani and Thandi Masuku at the helm; the upper-class
and white lifelong friends
- Beatrice Beit-Beauford and Kuki Carmichael who befriend Genie in the latter
part of their lives
- Jestina Nxumalo who works as a maid but later emigrates to Australia
- Bhekithemba Nyathi, a reporter from a wealthy African family whose
circumstances have been somewhat reduced
- Dr Mambo, an HIV specialist
- Goliath and the Survivors, a band of street children who are a part of Vida’s
street life
- The poor and disenfranchised war-veterans that have taken over the farm that
belonged to Beatrice Beit-Beauford
- Mr Mendelsohn, a Coloured undertaker made wealthy by the HIV/AIDS crisis.
• These multiple perspectives very intentionally, in turn, showcase the diversity in
terms of race, class, gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, physical ability and age
of the characters who make up this story and, therefore, the people who make up
this history
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