No Time Like the Present: Nadine Gordimer and the Burden of Telos

Abstract

Nadine Gordimer was widely criticised for her failure to take a stand against the injustices manifest in the post-apartheid regime (during the presidencies of Thabo Mbeki and Jacob Zuma). No Time Like the Present (2012) apparently set out to rectify this neglect: it presents a catalogue of contemporary failures, injustices and abominations, touching on almost every index of state failure. At the same time, the novel sanctifies both the struggle against apartheid and the brave comrades who fought for justice. Without challenging the rectitude of the anti-apartheid cause of activists, the article questions whether – in her final novel – Gordimer did not succumb to a version of “theology” that (in attributing telos to South African history) stunted her understanding of the present.

Opsomming

Nadine Gordimer is deur baie gekritiseer omdat sy nagelaat het om standpunt in te neem teen die ongeregtighede wat in die postapartheidsbestel (gedurende die presidentskap van Thabo Mbeki en Jacob Zuma onderskeidelik) voorgekom het. No Time Like the Present (2012) het skynbaar ten doel gehad om hierdie versuim reg te stel: dit is ʼn opsomming van hedendaagse mislukkings, ongeregtighede en gruwels, terwyl byna elke indeks van regeringsversuim aangeroer word. Terselfdertyd reg-verdig dit die stryd teen apartheid sowel as die dapper stryders wat hulle vir geregtigheid beywer het. Sonder om die opregtheid van aktiviste se anti-apart-heidsaak in twyfel te trek, vra hierdie artikel of Gordimer nie in haar laaste roman geswig het voor ʼn weergawe van “teologie” wat (deur telos toe te skryf aan Suid-Afrikaanse geskiedenis) haar begrip van die hede belemmer het nie.