The Heart Of Redness

Post-Apartheid South Africa

In Qolorha-by-Sea, “Camagu is filled with a searing longing for an imagined blissfulness of his youth” (59). His family left their ancestral village when he was a toddler “to settle in the township of Orlando East, in the city of Johannesburg” (59). Shortly after arriving in the village, he finds himself at a gathering thrown by Bhonco, to celebrate his daughter’s promotion to school principal. Bhonco welcomes him and sends Camagu inside the house so that this educated man can sit with the rest of the teachers. The Believers have boycotted the festivities, just as the Unbelievers refuse to attend feasts thrown by the Believers. The teachers at the table comment on this, asking, “How far can you stretch pettiness?” (62). 

When asked what brings him to Qolorha-by-Sea, Camagu repeats a story he has concocted to find the woman with whom he has become obsessed. He tells the teachers the story: 

[There was] a young woman called NomaRussia from these parts who worked for him in Johannesburg. He released her from work because he was going to the United States to live there. Only when he was on the way to the airport did he discover that NomaRussia had inadvertently taken his passport with her (63).