The personal and political history that is unfolded in Gordimer’s My Son’s Story is deliberately

narrated from an adolescent’s point of view. Examine critically.

Nadine Gordimer’s My Son’s Story published in 1990 examines closely the period of

interregnum in South Africa when apartheid system was still dominant while struggle for

freedom from the system was gaining larger ground. Nadine Gordimer through My Son’s Story

and her other works has unveiled the horrors of apartheid system in South Africa before the

western world. My Son’s Story addresses issues like race, gender, and class and power

distribution in the period of interregnum in South Africa. The novel explores both personal and

political space through the events taking place in the life of “coloured” male protagonist and his

family. My Son’s Story is Nadine Gordimer’s first novel where narrator as well as central

characters is non white. The following essay will focus on personal and political history as

depicted in the novel through Will, the adolescent son’s narration.

Gordimer has used dual narrative technique in My Son’s Story. First narrator is Will, who

is an adolescent son of the protagonist Sonny. Will gives a first person account of the events

taking place in his family. Will’s tone of narration is accusatory, full of anger, and devoid of any

philosophical angle. Many critics argue that Gordimer has represented Will in her own image as

a writer. Will critiques his father Sonny’s position both as the head of family as well as a

political activist. Will’s narration goes on simultaneously with a more mature, philosophical and

sympathetic voice of a second narrator. The nameless narrator presents events where Will is

absent from the scene or those events of which he is not aware. This narrator provides detailed

account on both political and personal proceeding in third person and in a chronological order.

The dual narrative mode brings out a fragmented effect, as both narrators contradict, oppose, and
also echo each other throughout the novel. Mita Bose states that:

“The regular alternation of the two narrative voices to communicate the

same events creates an oscillatory, unsettling, and destabilizing effect.”

At the end of the novel Will reveals that both the narrators are one, which comes as a surprise.

Will says in the last chapter:

“I’ve made up what I wasn’t there to experience myself. I wouldn’t

have been aware of, at the period when it was happening.”

It seems as though Gordimer has deliberately recreated the story from an adolescent point view

in order to critique personal and political history which is definitely achieved through Sonny’s

glorification in the beginning and then his eventual downfall at the end.

The novel opens dramatically with Will finding out about his father’s affair with a white

woman named Hannah Plowman. The story takes shape from the moment of revelation of

Sonny’s illicit affair described in Will’s perspective alongside the detailed chronological account

of Sonny’s life history as told by the other narrator. The novel focuses on the difficult

relationship of father son duo. Will hates his father due to his betrayal but at the same time he

admires him for his intellectual and political activism. Will’s love/hate relationship with his

father can be interpreted in terms of psychoanalysis as Oedipus complex since Will is constantly

shown aggressive towards his father’s sexuality. He uses “sexually charged” language and also

fancies his father’s mistress. Will says:

“He (Sonny) is not moving aside, off women’s bodies for me. I need not

think, because I am as tall as him and I have got the same things between

my legs, He needs to give over to me. The old bull still own the cows,

he is still capable of serving his harem, my mother and his blond.”

The relationship then becomes a struggle for power and authority between father and son.

Gordimer has thus, shown a family located in interregnum which is going through a phase of

transition. Sonny a school teacher becomes a part of ongoing freedom movement. From Aila’s

husband, Sonny becomes Hannah’s lover. Eventually Sonny gets entangled in managing family,

politics and Hannah and end up losing all. Sonny’s obsession with “needing Hannah” shatters his

family as well as his political reputation. Sonny looks up to Hannah as an equal and accomplice

in the political struggle. He combines political commitment and sexual pleasure in the figure of

Hannah Plowman. But he fails to serve his political commitment when during the firing in

cleansing of the grave ceremony he chose to leave a man to die in order to protect Hannah. Thus,

Sonny and Hannah both appear as flawed in their stance in the political movement. Sonny not

only betrays his family but also the movement for freedom due to his obsession with “needing

Hannah”.

It is at this moment when “coloured” women of the family, Aila and Baby, Sonny’s wife

and daughter respectively join the movement much to the surprise of Sonny, Will and Hannah.

Aila transforms from a silent, meek and obedient wife to a revolutionary carrying out difficult

tasks such as storing and transporting guns to militants. Aila silently suffers her husband’s

betrayal only to liberate herself and create an individual identity as a revolutionary and becomes

independent of Sonny. Sonny’s and Hannah’s engagement with politics is criticized because

their idea of struggle against the apartheid system exists only in the realm of ideas, debates and

discussions whereas Aila and Baby performs what is really needed to combat the dominant

system not by merely indulging in dialogues rather acting upon it. It is not just Sonny betraying

his family as it is seen that Aila and Baby betray the male members of the family too by secretly

joining the movement. Baby’s suicide attempt, then going underground for the movement and
getting married in exile could be seen as protest against her father’s betrayal and disloyalty.

Sonny is no more a part of his daughter’s life. So at the end, women of the family take control

and leave the house, thus Sonny is left without a wife, daughter and mistress. Jorshinelle Sonze

in ‘“My Turn Now”: Debunking the Gordimer “mystique” in My Son’s Story’ states that, “the

novel transforms the male centered text into a more womanly space.”

In the novel, political and personal space is seen to be porous. Personal living space

becomes ground for political activities and political relationship takes the form of a love affair.

Will’s narration gives perspective of a coloured adolescent boy living in a period of conflict.

Although Will never engages in political movement directly, he passively takes part in the

movement for freedom through his writing. Thus unlike others he takes up the pen instead of gun

to fight for freedom. In the end, father and son are still together and their house in “grey area” is

burned down by white neighbors. The destruction of Sonny’s house can be seen as collapse of all

personal relationships in the wake of political revolution since now the personal and political

become one and the same.

Works Cited

Bose, Mita. “Introduction” My Son’s Story.

Gordimer, Nadine. My Son’s Story. 1990. Worldview Critical Edition.

Sonza, Jorshinelle. “ “My Turn Now”: Debunking the Gordimer “mystique” in My Son’s Story.”