The covenant - James A. Michener [0]
Michener, James
Published: 1987
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SUMMARY:
Adventurers, scoundrels and missionaries. The best and worst of two continents carve an empire out of the vast wilderness that is to become South Africa. For hundreds of years, their rivalries and passions spill across the land. From the first Afrikaners to the powerful Zulu nation, and the missionaries who lived with both--all of them will influence and take part in the wars and politics that will change a nation forever.THE COVENANT: generations of people who forge a new world in a story of adventure and heroism, love and loyalty, cruelty and betrayal.
THE COVENANT
by
James Michener
CONTENTS
Introduction
I. Prologue
II. Zimbabwe
III. A Hedge of Bitter Almonds
IV. The Huguenots
V. The Trekboers
VI. The Missionary
VII. Mfecane
VIII. The Voortrekkers
IX. The Englishmen
X. The Verloo Commando
XI. Education of a Puritan
XII. Achievement of a Puritan
XIII. Apartheid
XIV. Diamonds
Introduction
No writer could have a more challenging assignment than the writing of a novel which would explain the beauty, the anguish and the hope of the Republic of South Africa as it struggles to find a just form of government. And no one would be qualified to try unless she or he understood four basic truths. First, the land itself is magnificent, a garden filled with one of the world's richest collections of animal life. Second, the Dutch who settled it at about the same time that our ancestors were settling the future United States were the same sturdy, admirable people who established New York. Third, the English who came later were the same kinds of pioneers who crossed the ocean to build our American colonies; they were indistinguishable from the men and women of Massachusetts and Virginia. Fourth, the black tribes which occupied the southern end of the African continent in the early days were some of the finest, strongest natives in Africa and the equal in every respect to the blacks who would make valuable contributions to American life.
The land and the people of South Africa formed a magnificent union, for each component is the best of its kind. The problem was that in the course of national history some unfortunate decisions were made, wrong turns in the relationships between groups which produced ugly results. The problem today is to unravel the animosities that grew up and point the nation in a constructive new direction. The rest of the world should wish the Republic well as it changes course.
I have loved the visits I made to the kraals of South Africa, to the splendid cities, to the first-rate colleges, to the gold and diamond mines, to the historic sites and the black communities and, of course, to the incredible wild-life parks half a dozen of them, including the finest in the world, Kreuger. I had only the most rewarding time in the country, probing into the corners, meeting with citizens of all groups. In The Covenant I have tried to weave an honest account of how the land and the people were in the various stages of their history, down to the 1970s. I would hope that reading the novel would shed some light on what's now happening in the 1990s.
James A. Michener
Texas Center for Writers
November 27, 1990
This introduction was written expressly for The Easton Press edition of The Covenant.
Note
Mr. Errol L. Uys, a distinguished South African editor and journalist now living in the United States, was exceedingly helpful in the preparation of this manuscript. With a rare understanding of his birthplace and its people, he was able to clarify historical and social factors which an outsider might misinterpret, to correct verbal usage, and to verify data difficult to check. Working together for two years, we read the finished manuscript together seven times, twice aloud, a most demanding task. I thank him for his assistance.
James A. Michener
St. Michaels, Md.
Christmas 1979
Acknowledgments
On my latest visit to South Africa, I was treated with invariable courtesy, and when it became known that I