Synthèse L'écrivain dans son siècle

Synthèse LELE

L'écrivain dans don siècle

Theme: The writter in his century

Key question: How and why Nadine Gordimer chooses to write a faire tale to denounce an evil of her time: Apartheid?

1. HOW
   A. A fairy tale

-Why she chooses a fairy tale? → to contrast

-The vocabulary typical of a fairy tale

B. A reversed fairy tale

-The vocabulary of horror and violence

-The house

-Doc personnel

      II.WHY

 A. To denounce Apartheid

-The words illustrating Apartheid

-Apartheid: crimes, gated communities

B. Words or violence

-The debate: we should use words or violence

-What is the most efficient for you → the words

INTRO

The theme: The writter in his century is illustrated by Once Upon a Time Nadine Gordimer. My key question is: how and why Nadine Gordimerr chooses to write a fairy tale to denounce an evil of her time: Apartheid?

In my first part I'm going to talk about how she writes this fairy tale and in my second part I will show why she denounce this evil.

I.HOW

     First at all we can ask ourselves why Nadine Gordimer chooses a fairy tale. I guess that she writes a fairy tale to contrast with her reality. A fairy tale is suppose to be a very happy story with a happy end but Apartheid was dreadful and cruel. She shows us this contrast patircularly at the end because this fairy tale don't have a happy end.

Nevertheless, she uses the vocabulaty typical of a fairy tale, like « wise old witch » l.11, and also the title Once Upon a Time wich is the beginning of all the fairy tale stories. Furthermore, she repeats « happily » all along the story and she doesn't give a name for anyone in this story, she call them « the wife, the husband, the little boy,etc ».

     We can call this story a reversed fairy tale, because despite all this vocabulary typical of a fairy tale she also employs the vocabulary of horror and violence, like « there are police and soldier and tear-gas and guns » l.27, « buses were being burned, cars stoned, and school crildren shot by the police » l.28-29 « the bleeding mass of the little boy » l.105. This house wich is described like a place of safety for this family, between all this chaos, also become a place of nightmare for this happy family.

     My personal document is also a reversed fairy tale that I wrote in class. It's the story  about a happy family but at the end this family is broken because that the mother wanted to protest for women's rights.

II.WHY

     In this second part we are going to see why she denounce this evil. In this fairy tale Nadine Gordimer used words to illustrate Apartheid like « where people of another colour were quartered » l.22, and « the riots » l.36. She also used words to denounce the crime in her country:  « armed robbery » l.93, « many burglaries in the suburb » l.36-37, « tied up and shut in a cupboard by thieves » l.37-38, and to denounce gated communities « these people were not allowed into the suburb, exept for realible housemaids and gardeners, there was nothing to fear » l.23-24.

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