The Lemon Orchard Analysis

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The Lemon Orchard is a short story which is a part of a huge collection of many talented
authors’ stories, one of them being, Alex La Guma. The story is mainly placed in 1962 in South
Africa, where these men are walking down the lemon orchard on a winter night. There were 4
white people and 1 colored man. It had seemed to be a party consisting of 1 leader and 3
followers. 1 of the white people had a battery-powered lantern and was on a cycle ahead of
everyone else. And the 3 other white people were apparently talking and treating the colored man
as a culprit. The leader, who had a gun, kept on provoking, taunting and insulting the colored
man for being uncivilized with the minister of the church. The colored man was a teacher at a
school, where the white men sent their children. The poor man was afraid of them but also had
stubbornness in him against them.

At that time, in 1962, there was apartheid between the white people, and the colored/black
people, that is why we see so much power from the white people in the story. We can also see
that at that time the churches were given more importance than law and government. Also Alex
La Guma has described the leader of the group as very short-tempered and a person who handles
guns well. He wore laced up riding boots which was common at that time.

In the story there were many links between the character, plot and setting. Because of the setting
one can understand the atmosphere at that time. For example, we can relate that in the year 1962,
there was a big racial influence, also shown in the story, and because of the slang terms for
colored man (“hotnot”), black man (“kaffir”) we get to recognize the different characters in the
story. He mentions “coloured man” which means, a person of mixed European white and African
black. Also in the story, Alex La Guma has mentioned the clothing of that time, for example, the
laced up riding boots and corduroy pants.

A literary device known as personification was used in the story when Alex La Guma was trying
to give a personality to the darkness, in Page 195, Line 16, “as if the darkness demanded
silence”. In the text Alex La Guma wrote, he has used terms like “hotnot”, “kaffir”, “colored
man”, “baas” to make the readers identify the real world of that time. One can understand that
Alex La Guma has used Afrikaans words, like “Oom” (Boss/Uncle/Sir). If you look at the South
Africa – 1962 page, you can understand that at that time, an racial discrimination was occurring
on between the blacks and the whites in South Africa. After analyzing the setting, reading the
conversations and researching on the South Africa in 1962, we can connect the story to a real
world situation even though it is a fictitious story. Also the mention of the clothing, connects to
the real world. Alex La Guma has brings out various character traits with great writing skills. He
has used certain language as dialogues to convey the character trait. Also he explained after
certain dialogues in which the dialogue was conveyed, for example, Pg 197, 12th Line, when the
bounded man says “Yes baas”, the author explains the tone by writing “…speaking with a
mixture of dignity and contempt which was missed by those who surrounded him.” Also on Pg
196, last two lines, “ ‘I will shoot whatever hotnot or kaffir I desire… when they are spoken to.’”
This line shows the anger present in the leader.