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Chapter 45
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Kaffir Boy, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Apartheid’s Structural Oppression
Personal Prejudice
Tribal Identity vs. Modern Education
Anger, Hatred, and Violence
Christianity
Suffering, Survival, and Trauma
Summary
Analysis
Scaramouche introduces Mathabane to Andre Zietsman, a white tennis player from South African who has just returned from a tennis scholarship in America. Mathabane and Andre form a fast friendship and begin playing together, secretly, at a white park, running a considerable risk for both of them. As they grow more comfortable, Andre describes what America is like, including what a shock it was for him to suddenly live in a society where black people are equal with white people, rather than subordinate. It conflicted with Andre’s early education in South Africa, where he was taught to “lord over blacks.” The thought of black people existing equally alongside white people in one society stuns Mathabane. He thinks of it as “the Promised Land.”
Andre’s experience living and studying with black people as equals challenged his own learned racism, again suggesting that personal relationships with diverse people is critical to counteracting one’s personal prejudice. For Mathabane, Andre represents the hope that people, even white Afrikaners, can change their racist ways.
Themes
