Holding back Midnight

Maureen Isaacson

Characters

President Manzwe Mother Ethel Leon (husband) Dad Uncle Otto Louis Dutoit Joyce Dutoit

The daughter Paul Schoeman

President Manzwe

President Manzwe is the new President of South Africa after transformation

He is the first black President.

The daughter

She and her non-white husband, Leon, lives on a communal plot in the outer limits of the mega-city.

Mother

She is drinking She is old, and looks like a dead person They have ravaged voices from smoking

Ethel

The mother’s friend She is also old and ravished from

smoking.

Leon Laubscher

Leon is coloured He is married to the daughter The dogs always bark at him because of his

colour Leon is not bitter about the past. His motto is forgive and forget. He has equilibrium, he is peaceful. Laubscher is a white surname so people don’t

know immediately that he is a non-white.

Dad

The father is caught up in history He still lives in the Old South Africa and does not

want to change. He was a hotel owner. White men used his hotel rooms to sleep with

women of another colour These meetings were not allowed in the Old

South Africa He is the perfect host at the party.

Dad

He was very rich and had connection in the government during the old regime.

He was a miner but made his money with the hotel.

They owned three game farms and four cars. The new regime took away some of his farms

because of the redistribution of wealth policy.

Uncle Otto

Ex-minister of Home Affairs He lost his position when the government

changed. He was one of her father’s guests at the

hotel He calls the prostitutes angels.

Louis Dutoit

A Dentist A family friend Still believes in the Old Johannesburg Louis only treats white people.

Joyce Dutoit

Still believes in Old Johannesburg as it was during Apartheid.

Paul Schoeman

The old minister of Law and Order. He cannot understand that the daughter

lives in a native township (Soweto) He wears a panic button around his neck

which is set off when he pulls the daughter too close to him when dancing.

Setting

Set in the last minutes before midnight, 31 December 1999.

South Africa is on the brink of the new millenium.

Women wear recyclable dresses and everyone uses paper gloves in restaurants to prevent the transmission of AIDS.

Plot The daughter and her non-white husband is at her parents New

Year’s party. They await the arrival of the year 2000. Some of the guests are ministers from the old regime. The characters find themselves in the new South Africa Through the conversations you hear that the old generation is not

accepting the changes. The daughter sets off Paul Schoeman’s panic button when they

dance Armed security guards arrive and the dogs are let out. They insinuate that the husband is hiding because the dogs don’t

like him Midnight arrives and the father says no not yet, suggesting he is

holding back midnight

Intention

The writer concentrates on the past. The parents and their friends – among them

cabinet ministers from the old regime – refuse to relinquish the past.

The writer shows the difference between the views of the daughter and her parents.

The older generation can not read the signs that things have changed.

Intention

The older generation misinterprets the new freedom for anarchy (chaos and disorder)

The older generation protects themselves with security guards, panic buttons and dogs.

The old generation tell stories of lifts not working and rubbish piling up

The heading of the story

‘Holding back midnight’ can be interpreted figuratively.

Nobody is able to stop midnight (12’o clock) from happening.

Midnight refers figuratively to the New South Africa, change, events,.

By not accepting the new government the father and his friends are holding back the arrival of the new regime.

Old South Africa

Cheap labour was the cause of ghettos. Afrikaans and English are the only official

languages.

New South Africa

The ghetto’s got smaller when there was no more cheap labour

There are more shebeens and malls that play jazz in the old poverty stricken township.

Soweto is connected to Johannesburg with a skyway and a highway

Soweto runs on foreign funding There are millions of people, of all races, living in the

new exciting and modern Soweto. They plant organic food. They care about Johannesburg.

New South Africa

The daughter wears a dress made of paper. They recycle their products. There is a downswing in crime. Because of the redistribution of wealth there are

no more poor people. Afrikaans and English are not the official

languages.