PLAYING IN THE LIGHT : a novel - Hardcover

Zoe Wicomb

3.56

487 ratings by Goodreads

9781595580474: PLAYING IN THE LIGHT : a novel

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1595580476 ISBN 13: 9781595580474

Publisher: The New Press, 2006

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Set in a beautifully rendered 1990s Cape Town, Zo� Wicomb’s celebrated novel revolves around Marion Campbell, who runs a travel agency but hates traveling, and who, in post-apartheid society, must negotiate the complexities of a knotty relationship with Brenda, her first black employee. As Alison McCulloch noted in the New York Times, “Wicomb deftly explores the ghastly soup of racism in all its unglory—denial, tradition, habit, stupidity, fear—and manages to do so without moralizing or becoming formulaic.”

Caught in the narrow world of private interests and self-advancement, Marion eschews national politics until the Truth and Reconciliation Commission throws up information that brings into question not only her family’s past but her identity and her rightful place in contemporary South African society. “Stylistically nuanced and psychologically astute” (Kirkus), Playing in the Light is as powerful in its depiction of Marion’s personal journey as it is in its depiction of South Africa’s bizarre, brutal history.

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Review:

"Post-apartheid South Africa is indeed a new world. . . . With this novel, Wicomb proves a keen guide." —The New York Times

"Delectable. . . . Wicomb’s prose is as delightful and satisfying in its culmination as watching the sun set over the Atlantic Ocean." —Christian Science Monitor

"[A] thoughtful, poetic novel." —The Times (London)

"Deep and subtle. . . . This tight, dense novel gives complex history a human face." —Kirkus

Synopsis:

Set in a beautifully rendered 1990s Cape Town, "Playing in the Light" revolves around Marion, a woman of Afrikaner background, who hates travelling but nonetheless runs a travel agency, and her complex relationship with Brenda, the first black woman she has ever employed. In writing as finely detailed and attuned to psychological nuance as Anita Brookner's, Wicomb depicts the life of a single, complicated woman in a changing and complicated place. Caught up in the narrow world of private interests and self-advancement, Marion eschews national politics until the exposures of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission lead to the discovery of a skeleton in the family cupboard. While her aging father is unable and unwilling to supply the truth, Marion's young employee becomes implicated in the piecing together of Marion's past, leading to a defining transformation and widening of Marion's world. In this impeccably wrought new work, the acclaimed author of "You Can't Get Lost in Cape Town" provides wisdom and insight about the new South Africa and about people everywhere.

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