Choose TWO STORIES that show divisions or conflicts within communities. For each story write about:
- What these actual divisions/conflicts are
- How the divisions/conflicts occur
- How the writer describes the effects on the people involved.
Both of the stories ‘The train from Rhodesia’ and ‘Leela’s Friend’ illustrate divisions of classes and some of them result in conflicts. ‘The train from Rhodesia’ is in an allegory form to convey the deep hatred of the author towards her racially divided home country – apartheid. ‘Leela’s Friend’ shows the class division by demonstrating the prejudice that people have on those who are low in hierarchy.
‘The train from Rhodesia’ is about a train from Rhodesia ‘calling’ into the station with all the white passengers on it and there are the vendors who crowd round the train trying to sell their wares. The train is personified by using verbs such as ‘creaking, jerking, jostling, gasping’ and saying it has ‘a dwindling body behind it’. This emphasizes the classes divisions between the rich passengers on the train and the poor sellers in the station. The poverty of black people seems to be the reason for division. The ‘creases’ in stationmaster’s uniform and his ‘barefoot children’ all give the impression of scarcity in the people inside the station. However, the girl on the train was ‘throwing’ a ‘hard kind’ chocolate to the dogs. This use of antithesis here accentuates the division – not only in class – but also in poverty.