Page 111 - November 2020
P. 111
111
Litterateur
November 2020
An inconvenient guest – A Rude Awakening
I turned to my Italian friend, who translated the teacher’s words. With a heavy
heart and a confused mind, I tucked it inside my book bag. After that day, my
doll didn’t seem quite so special anymore. I hid it away in a dark corner of a
closet and never took it out again. It wasn’t until a few years later, when I was
old enough to understand the meaning of the word “apartheid”, that I
understood. My doll had always been beautiful. It was simply an inconvenient
guest.
Author’s note: With the enactment of apartheid laws in 1948, racial
discrimination against non-whites in South Africa was implemented. Under the
apartheid regime, black dolls were banned, among other items, and were rarely
seen until well after the end of the regime in the nineties, when Nelson Mandela
became president. Some popular music and many books were also banned for
political reasons, including the classic Black Beauty, just because it had the
words “black” and “beauty” in the title.
