Family and Nation in Crises: Female characters in Selected Recent South African Novels

Abstract

Studies have shown that representations of young women are articulated through masculine perceptions, especially in recent South African novels. This is evident in many South African literary texts where black female characters are dependent on the writer’s knowledge and views about black women. As a result, many scholars have grappled with the phenomenon of black female representation where authors represent female characters in a biased manner. These representations are contested by many female writers with the call for balanced representations in literary texts. As a result, several female writers have taken to writing fiction in order to address these stereotypes in representation. The urge for balanced representation is an important aspect of novels by female black South African writers. This study examines representations of black female characters by three black female South African writers. The selected novels provide readers with insights into the contested representations of female characters as these intersect with the recent post-apartheid South African moment. The selected novels are Kopano Matlwa’s Coconut (2009) & Period Pain (2017), Angela Makholwa's Blessed Girl (2017) and Cynthia Jele’s The Ones with Purpose (2018).