Alan Paton: Cry the Beloved Country  (2585 words)  Cry, The
Beloved country, the first novel by south African Alan Paton,
grew out of the author's experiences as the principal of a
Diepkloof Reformatory in Natal Province. Published in 1948,
shortly before the apartheid laws went into effect, the novel
depicts the deep racial division between whites and blacks and
the bitter acrimony that resulted from discriminatory practices
in personal and business relationships in South Africa. Paton's
emphasis is on the disparity between the natural world found in
the rural parts of his native land, an area replete with rolling
hills and productive agricultural locales, and the populous
urban areas represented by Johannesburg, where racial tensions
are exacerbated by radically different …   Meyer, Michael J..
"Cry the Beloved Country". The Literary Encyclopedia. First
published 10 December 2009 [, accessed 12 December 2013.]