| The Smell of Apples | |
|---|---|
| Author(s) | Mark Behr |
| Country | South Africa |
| Language | English |
| Genre(s) | Novel |
| Publisher | Queillerie (RSA), Abacus (UK) |
| Publication date | 1993 |
| Media type | Hardback and paperback |
| Pages | 200 pp |
| ISBN | 0-349-10756-4 |
| OCLC Number | 60267194 |
The Smell of Apples is a 1995 debut novel by South African Mark Behr, also published in the same year in Afrikaans as Die Reuk van Appels.
Mark Behr describes the Afrikaner mentality and in apartheid South Africa as seen through the eyes of a 10-year-old boy called Marnus, the son of an Army General. A movie based on the book is planned for a release in 2011, starring Julian McMahon and Gillian Anderson.[1]
Contents |
Marnus Erasmus is an eleven-year-old boy who lives in the late sixties with his family in Cape Town, South Africa. The Erasmus' live as a white family in a country which is mostly inhabited by coloured people. The white people rule South Africa and Marnus' father is an important general in the army. The white population in South Africa descended from the British immigrants, who came while the country was a colony of Great Britain, and the Boers, who are descendants of the Dutch settlers.[2]
Marnus grows up believing that black people are second class people due to having been indoctrinated by the apartheid system and his parents' views. On the other hand we, the readers, see that all Marnus's encounters with black people have actually been good. Marnus´ father does not like black people because his father, Marnus´ grandfather, and his family were driven away and their land expropriated by the black masses from Tanganyika, today's Tanzania. They fled to South Africa and, with the white population, turned it into a modern state. Now Marnus´ father thinks that the black people are going to destroy all that they have built and that the white people have to prevent this by controlling the native Africans.
Marnus´ best friend is Frikkie, who is also white. They attend the same school and every minute in their free time they meet up with each other. In the summer holidays Frikkie stays with Marnus in the Erasmus´ house, where Marnus' father often meets generals from other countries. He tells Marnus that he is not allowed to tell anybody else that there is a soldier from another country there, and that he shall call the visitors Mr. Smith. During the summer, a Mr. Smith from Chile visits the family. At dinner Marnus´ father and the general speak about the political situation in the world. Mr. Smith says that he is relieved that his army has overthrown the government of Allende due to cooperating with the Communists. Marnus´ father tells the general South Africa is also in a very bad position because the world is "against his country". He explains that the other states are against them and claim that the white people in South Africa are discriminative against the black population.[2] Marnus makes an agreement with Frikkie that they will tell each other all their secrets, which is why Marnus ignores his father's warning not to tell anybody that he speaks with Mr. Smith. Marnus tells Frikkie that the whole world is against South Africa and that the coloured people are to blame for that.
One night Marnus wakes up and he notices that Frikkie is not in his bed. He can see the spare room through the floor-boards in his room and witnesses Frikkie being raped. He assumes the rapist is Mr. Smith who is supposed to have left that night, and goes downstairs to wake his parents, but finds his father is not in bed. He goes back upstairs and observes that the man who is raping Frikkie does not have a scar on his back like the General (Mr. Smith) and realises that it is his father. The next day he asks Frikkie if something happened during the night but Frikkie does not tell Marnus anything. Frikkie says that he has decided to go home and he does not want to stay longer. Marnus reassures himself that Frikkie will never tell anyone what happened..