Reverend Kumalo

Amanda Armstrong

Ms. Mullarky

AP Lit.

12 September 2007

Prompt E: Reverend Kumalo

Reverend Stephen Kumalo, the protagonist in Alan Paton's Cry, The Beloved Country, faces many the culturally differing people of his country during his time in Johannesburg. Cultural dissimilarities and ethnic variations send waves of culture shock through the minds native ministers like Kumalo. Alan Paton uses Rev. Kumalo to demonstrate Kumalo's fading identity and the way he responds to conflicting events in his life.

Ndotsheni is a very tranquil village where native Zulus worship their god and the people pray for rain to feed the soil. Johannesburg is contradictory to Ndotsheni. "When people go to Johannesburg, they do not come back." (39) Kumalo's sister, brother, and son reside in Johannesburg and not one of them writes, but upon receiving a letter from another reverend saying his sister Gertrude is ill Kumalo says to his wife "I do not hurt myself; it is they who are hurting me. My own son, my own sister, my own brother." (39) The people once closest to Kumalo, suddenly seem foreign to him making him question his being. Kumalo experiences feelings of disconnection from the world around him, and the people who once influenced his life.

Carrying barely enough money to live on, Kumalo's quest to aid his sister ends up veering in several other directions. After discovering that there is a murder involving his son, Kumalo desires an answer to his lack of identity. Unable to speak, Kumalo's reaction to the news is shy and perplexed. Kumalo's response to the ethical and cultural conflicts between Ndotsheni and Johannesburg show the difficulty of accepting change in a traditional lifestyle. This type of isolation causes Kumalo to loose his sense of identity while he is anywhere but home.

As Kumalo struggles with his diminishing sense of self, his son's fate is determined; the court finds the reverend's son Absalom, guilty of murder. While the regional and cultural changes assist in the thinning identity