An Instant in the Wind

What is it that makes South African authors incapable of happy endings?Having read and enjoyed JM Coetzee's bleak "Disgrace" I found Brink's novel in a second hand shop and went to work. In subject matter it is a blending of two Patrick White novels - "Voss" about a doomed journey to the (Australian) interior, and "A Fringe of Leaves" about a white woman's life among Aborigines after a 19th Century shipwreck.In Brink's hands, in 1750, a naive but spirited white woman from the Cape accompanies her Swedish explorer husband into the upmapped interior, only to find herself alone when the husband dies and the Hottentot retainers head for the hills.She is found by a runaway slave, Adam, who for reasons of his own agrees to set off with her to the Cape.Brink vividly describes the country through which they must travel. Against its physical presence, the couple become lovers. All of this is good fun. Brink was writing at a time when black/white relationships were forbidden under apartheid law. Indeed, the book for a while was banned. He delivers us a vintage love story, full of sex and spirit. (Funny how Coetzee, 25 years later when inter-racial sex is no longer verboten, sees the politics of such relationships in an entirely different way).As Brink signals in the opening pages, however, there is no happy-ever-after. If there had been (the story purports to be based on truth), South Africa's history might have been different.At times, the writing has less to do with black and white than purple, especially as Brink creates a seaside idyll for his pair, but for my money it's a grand read. It recalls a time when white South African liberals believed if only people could see their true nature everything would be all right.Coetzee's darker - and more recent - version is that WHEN people are most true to their nature, South Africans have much to fear.

A wonderful read. A powerfully written love story between a slave and a white woman in 18th century South Africa. The South African landscape is revealed in all it's harshness and beauty. The story of the two characters are based on fact which makes the story even more phenomenal. A masterpiece.

Instant in the Wind is one of the most beautiful love stories I have read. After an exploring team is killed in the jungle, a slave on the run is forced to accompany a surviving white woman and together they travel across the desert. During their long walk throughout the country, their relationship evolves. As they learn about each other, we discover all the details of life in South Africa in the 18th century. Brink's writing is at its most powerful, poetic, so moving in describing this heartbreaking love story. A masterpiece of literature.