ENG ASSIGNTMENT 03: THE NOVEL SMALL THINGS BY NTHIKENG MOHLELE
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Course
ENG1501 - Foundations In English Literary Studies
Institution
University Of South Africa
ENG1501
ASSIGNTMENT 03: THE NOVEL
SMALL THINGS BY NTHIKENG MOHLELE
ENG1501
ASSIGNTMENT 03: THE NOVEL
SMALL THINGS BY NTHIKENG MOHLELE
DUE DATE: 12 AUGUST 2020
UNIQUE NUMBER:
STUDENT NUMBER:
Trauma, whether emotional or physical, can have a large effect on a person and their outlook
to...
eng1501 10476725 assigntment 03 the novel small things by nthikeng mohlele
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University of South Africa
ENG1501 - Foundations In English Literary Studies
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ENG1501 10476725
ASSIGNTMENT 03: THE NOVEL
SMALL THINGS BY NTHIKENG MOHLELE
, ENG1501 10476725
ASSIGNTMENT 03: THE NOVEL
SMALL THINGS BY NTHIKENG MOHLELE
DUE DATE: 12 AUGUST 2020
UNIQUE NUMBER: 541963
STUDENT NUMBER: 10476725
Trauma, whether emotional or physical, can have a large effect on a person and their outlook
towards life. In the given extract, we see the narrator’s inability to move on from the trauma
of Sophia town’s demolitions, an unrequited love and eighteen years of being an apartheid
political prisoner, and how this affects his dreams and aspirations as a poet and musician.
This essay will discuss the themes of despair, elusive inner happiness, home, and resentment
present in Nthikeng Mohlele’s Small Things as a means to explore the development of the
narrator’s own internal conflict.
The theme of despair can be glimpsed in the given extract when the narrator states “It will
never make sense to me why the eighteen-year punishment. I admit: I am not Desmond Tutu.
Or a Nelson. I have come to realize that underlying my apparent indifference is irresolvable
anger; anger in search of meaning” (Mohlele, 2013:103). We can ascertain that the narrator
has a sharp tongue for social exegesis and is clearly filled to the brim with unfiltered despair
and but also passion. The diction used is informal because it is more conversational and
narrative. The extract was written in an informative manner which shows us that the narrator
sees himself as nothing, as compared to “the heroes” Desmond Tutu or Nelson Mandela, who
made a change in people’s lives. His internal conflict is anger that searches for meaning it
does not find. He is conflicted because he doesn’t understand why he spent nearly two
decades in prison, only to come out and wander the streets of Johannesburg unlike other
‘heroes’. Namely, he compares himself to Che Guevara who died with little reward. He
therefore sees himself dying without reward for his silence; all the years he spent in prison
meant nothing because he did not come out as a hero who fought for something important.
We also get a sense of hopelessness when the narrator says that “…martyrdom is not only
when you’re dead and buried; there are many walking dead” (Mohlele, 2013:103), because
we see that the narrator sees himself as a dead man walking. He is “bruised by the revolution”
and spent and last eighteen years of his life in prison, breaking his back and doing hard labour
only to be defenceless against “thugs that emerge from nowhere, demanding things” and
seems to see himself as an utterly useless person. (Mohlele, 2013:103-104)
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