Cry, The Beloved Country: Relationship between the Government and Citizens of 1946

Cry, the Beloved Country Essay

In the novel Cry, the beloved country the relationship between the fathers and sons has a close symbolic relation to the relationship between the government and the citizens of 1946. This can be seen in the responsibility, different views, protection and the involvement between the fathers and sons and the government and the citizens in 1946.
There are very different views between the fathers and sons such as how Arthur Jarvis has a very against segregation view to his father James Jarvis, who was against the black people being able to vote but he was not against or pro segregation. This can relate to the government’s views on being pro segregation “for the cutting up of South Africa without delay into separate areas” because it brings more order to society “where white can live without black, and black without white” but in the people’s view that are against segregation do not think there is a difference between the blacks and the whites.
There is a close relation between how the fathers are not involved in the sons’ lives and responsible for them: Mrs and Stephen do not know where their son, Absalom, was in Johannesburg because “they go to Johannesburg, and there they are lost, and no one hears of them at all”. This relationship continues with how the government is also not involved with the citizens of 1946 and responsible for them. Such as how Arthur Jarvis does not think that what the government is doing with segregation is the right thing because the South Africa now “is a tragic compound of great ideal and fearful practice” and how if the government had been involved they could have seen how the citizens felt about what they were doing to South Africa.
The relationship between how the fathers do not protected the sons is similar to how the government did not protect their citizens. How the fathers do not protect their sons is by letting them go into the world without the sons really knowing what could happen in the real world. Stephen Kumalo did not teach Absalom how Johannesburg was because he himself did not know and because of this Absalom killed a man and now” the tribe was broken, and would be mended no more”. With the government not being able to protect the citizen it was from thing like crime and poverty because if the citizens were protected then Arthur Jarvis would not have been killed by Absalom Kumalo and Absalom would not have needed to break into Arthur Jarvis’s house if he was not in poverty.
The responsibility of the fathers for the sons closely relates to the responsibility of the government for the citizens because both the fathers and the government have the responsibility to look after and be involved with their sons and citizens lives. The different views of the fathers to the sons closely relates to the different views of the government to the citizens because both the fathers and the government are pro segregation whilst the sons and the citizens are against segregation. The lack of protection from the fathers for the sons closely relates to the lack of protection from the government for the citizens because if both the fathers and the government had protected and informed the sons and the citizens then the death of Arthur Jarvis and Absalom Kumalo would not have happened.