Use of Landscape
Introduction
Nature is often used to convey meaning in writings. Examples of the use of nature is in the short stories “The chief Mshlanga” by Lessing D. and “The Guest” by Camus, A. In writing this short story, “The old chief Mshlanga”, Lessing saw a potential of the ways in which the society could change or even better advance. The story shows colonialism. Landscape is used in this story to show the behavior of the whites who have inhabited a southern African country, Rhodesia.
It is used to show how the behaviors of the Africans and whites are different and that this creates great divisions and these divisions are maintained in ways that they cannot be overcome. On the other hand, the story, “the Guest” shows a sight of the human situation. It shows the conditions that human beings are exposed to and in desperation. For instance, the situation of hunger and dependence on aid for food, as well as drought. People experience diverse ways of suffering including the oppression by others and the cruelty caused by nature.
Discussion
In the short story, “the old chief Mshlanga,” the author was struggling for the liberation of the black people. The narrator is a girl by the name Nkosikaas. Nkosikaas tells the story of the way in which she grew up knowing how immense the landscape of Africa was. In the story, the narrator tells of her experiences while living in a society that is dominated by the whites in Rhodesia, southern Africa.
The author uses a “jutting piece of rock” (2723). This is a rock that thrusts out of the soil. This rock which is in a field where the vegetation is sparse can be taken to be an intrusion within this scenery. Thus, just in a similar way, the whites who have inhabited Africa are intruders and they are not in any way welcome to Africa. In this story, the narrator, since she wants the liberation of the Africans, longs to go to another place where she would be more welcome and would belong to. This is shown in the way she imagines of the cold northern forests, as well as a pale gleaming castle.
The author starts the story by showing how land ownership was poor in this African country. She compares her white father’s farm to a bush. Of course because large parts of the farm were not used. This is used to show the oppression that the Africans were going through in the hands of the whites. Despite being an African country and as would be expected, lands would be owned by Africans, large parts of the land were owned by the whites. Further, the remoteness of the Africans is also compared to trees and rocks. Thus, the whites view that they (the whites) are very important to the Africans and that the Africans are not modernized and that is why they colonize them so as to bring modernity to their land.
In the story, “the old chief Mshlanga” isolation is an experience of nature. For instance, when the white girl goes to visit the old chief in his Kraal, she greatly feels isolated and has nothing to comprehend. The girl neither finds anything that she can say to the chief nor his people. As the narrator the girl says that she found a “queer hostility in the landscape, a cold, hard, sullen indomitability that walked with me, as strong as a wall, as intangible as smoke; it seemed to say to me: you walk here as a destroyer” (2730). This coldness and hardness are used here to show that there are no apologies that can be made for the injustices that the people suffer.
However, after visiting the chief, the narrator starts having feelings of anxiety. The author says that the narrator seems to see birds menacingly calling and a dead spirit coming out of the trees and rocks. The same trees and rocks that were used to show a symbolism of the African remoteness are used to show fear. This is just a fear that may be taken to mean that the Africans despite standing long time of oppression can also revenge. At the end the narrator says “It was now late sunset, the sky a welter of colors, the birds singing their last songs” (2732) showing the end of the way of life of the natives and their powerlessness.
In the story, “The guest” the foothills are located between the plateau and the desert. Here, the desert is used to show the Arabs while the plateau shows the French. Thus, the foothills are used to show neutrality. By being placed between the plateau and the desert, they mean that people are supposed to be neutral. The house of Daru is located at the top of the plateau meaning that there are ethnic conflicts that are observed in Algeria.
The plateau is dominated by a terrain. This shows the silence of the universe towards the suffering of the people. The universe does not also sympathize with the people on their suffering. Thus, the people here are suffering the harshness of nature. As the author writes, “This is the way the region was, cruel to live in, even without men–who didn’t help matters either” (2577). Thus, the story portrays the meaning that human suffering is caused by nature as well. Something that is beyond the control of the people and thus they can only wait in desperation.
Further, the snow falls in the region showing the cruelty that the people suffer. After the people have waited and withstood eight months of drought, water falls in terms of snow. Snow is something that can not be harvested like water can. Further, snow comes with cold and thus even more suffering. Therefore, this shows how nature is not rational.
Poverty among the native people. As the author writes “poverty, that army of ragged ghosts wandering in the sunlight” (2575) it is evident that the native people suffered greatly. The sunlight here is used to show how immense the poverty was. It burned the natives as the heat of sunlight scorches people.
The four France Rivers that are drawn on the blackboard shows the political as well as the cultural differences that exist between the people inhabiting this region. It is the tension that exists between the culture of the Arabs and that of the French who rule the region. Though a similar harsh climate is experienced by the Arabs and the European Algerians, the tension that is the cultural and political tension between these two groups of people stops them from having any sense or felling of companionship.
In both stories, landscape is used to show give meaning to the stories. Both stories show the conditions and suffering of human beings. However, they are different in that the landscape that is used in the story, “the old chief Mshlanga” shows the human suffering that is caused by other human beings. For instance, Africans suffer in the hands of white colonists and the whites view them as useless creatures.The Africans are compared to birds. Birds are often considered as defenseless and unintelligent animals, and here, the Africans are seen as unintelligent, uncivilized and just as the birds do not pose any threat, so are the Africans to the colonialists.
It is only a deadly spirit that seems to come out of the cries of the birds and this comes from the trees and rocks. This is used to mean that the words and wishes of the Africans are all dead. Just as the trees and rocks can not communicate, so are the Africans and whites. The Africans do not have the opportunities to voice out their cries. Their words are as dead as the rocks from where the dead spirit comes from.
The author also uses animals to show how Africans are being viewed as useless and sub-human. The Africans are described as a mass of faceless tadpoles “they [the Africans] were an amorphous black mass, mingling and thinning and massing tadpole” (2727). Thus, just as animals can be manipulated, beaten and even killed, to the whites, the Africans appeared as such. Despite being in their land, their main aim of existence is to act as servants. That is the view that these colonies whites have of the Africans and they treat them that way.
The contrast here is that the short story “the guest” shows the suffering of human beings but one that is caused by nature. For instance, even after the snow which fades away, the people are left with nothing to be happy of. “When all the snow had melted, the sun would take over again and once more would burn the fields of stone. For days, still, the unchanging sky would shed its dry light on the solitary expanse where nothing had any connection with man” (2579). This cruelty of nature is experienced by all people, the prisoners, the natives and even the colonists.
Conclusion
In “the old chief Mshlanga” the narrator tries to be friendly to the Africans but it fails. Thus, as long as there is the existence of colonialism, natives and colonists can not be equal. Further, in “the guest”, despite suffering similar ordeals caused by nature, the European Algerians and Arabs cannot be companions. Therefore, these two short stories show that people are different and thus struggles to make them equal can not be fruitful. Human beings can cause suffering to others and this is selective in that they choose the people to direct their ways of oppression to. However, nature is not selective and when it strikes all the people in the region feel the suffering.
Reference
Lawall, S.N. (2003). The Norton Anthology of World Literature. 2nd Ed. W W Norton & Co Inc publishers.
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