The Grass is Singing: Chapter 4 Summary & Analysis

In the morning Mary wakes up alone. Dick comes into the bedroom in his pajamas shortly after, and they have a “polite and awkward” conversation. An elderly native man enters, and Dick introduces him as Samson. Dick explains that Samson is “not a bad old swine,” but Mary is indignant about Samson’s casual manner. Dick drinks two cups of tea and goes out to work.

Mary walks past Samson, who is cleaning the living room, and goes out onto the veranda. Mary then walks around the house, circling back to find Samson making the beds. As a child, she was forbidden from talking to native people; like “every woman in South Africa,” she was taught to be afraid of them. Samson offers to show Mary the kitchen, where Dick keeps the food under lock and key but silently permits Samson to take a small portion for himself. Samson also shows Mary the plow disc, which is banged in the morning to wake up the workers and again in the middle of the day for the dinner break. Mary goes back inside while Samson prepares breakfast.

Half an hour later Dick returns and begins to shout at Samson in “kitchen kaffir,” the nickname for the language white settlers use to communicate with their black servants. Dick explains to Mary that Samson let the dogs go out into the bush, supposedly because Samson is too lazy to feed them. There are other problems on the farm as well, and Dick is clearly stressed. He leaves straight after breakfast, and before long the dogs come back. Mary attempts some cooking, before sitting down with a handbook of kitchen kaffir in order to make herself comprehensible to Samson.