Cape Coloured Quotes

Many things in this period have been hard to bear, or hard to take seriously. My own profession went into a protracted swoon during the Reagan-Bush-Thatcher decade, and shows scant sign of recovering a critical faculty—or indeed any faculty whatever, unless it is one of induced enthusiasm for a plausible consensus President. (We shall see whether it counts as progress for the same parrots to learn a new word.) And my own cohort, the left, shared in the general dispiriting move towards apolitical, atonal postmodernism. Regarding something magnificent, like the long-overdue and still endangered South African revolution (a jagged fit in the supposedly smooth pattern of axiomatic progress), one could see that Ariadne’s thread had a robust reddish tinge, and that potential citizens had not all deconstructed themselves into Xhosa, Zulu, Cape Coloured or ‘Eurocentric’; had in other words resisted the sectarian lesson that the masters of apartheid tried to teach them. Elsewhere, though, it seemed all at once as if competitive solipsism was the signifier of the ‘radical’; a stress on the salience not even of the individual, but of the trait, and from that atomization into the lump of the category. Surely one thing to be learned from the lapsed totalitarian system was the unwholesome relationship between the cult of the masses and the adoration of the supreme personality. Yet introspective voyaging seemed to coexist with dull group-think wherever one peered about among the formerly ‘committed’. Traditionally then, or tediously as some will think, I saw no reason to discard the Orwellian standard in considering modern literature. While a sort of etiolation, tricked out as playfulness, had its way among the non-judgemental, much good work was still done by those who weighed words as if they meant what they said. Some authors, indeed, stood by their works as if they had composed them in solitude and out of conviction. Of these, an encouraging number spoke for the ironic against the literal mind; for the generously interpreted interest of all against the renewal of what Orwell termed the ‘smelly little orthodoxies’—tribe and Faith, monotheist and polytheist, being most conspicuous among these new/old disfigurements. In the course of making a film about the decaffeinated hedonism of modern Los Angeles, I visited the house where Thomas Mann, in another time of torment, wrote Dr Faustus. My German friends were filling the streets of Munich and Berlin to combat the recrudescence of the same old shit as I read: This old, folkish layer survives in us all, and to speak as I really think, I do. not consider religion the most adequate means of keeping it under lock and key. For that, literature alone avails, humanistic science, the ideal of the free and beautiful human being. [italics mine] The path to this concept of enlightenment is not to be found in the pursuit of self-pity, or of self-love. Of course to be merely a political animal is to miss Mann’s point; while, as ever, to be an apolitical animal is to leave fellow-citizens at the mercy of Ideolo’. For the sake of argument, then, one must never let a euphemism or a false consolation pass uncontested. The truth seldom lies, but when it does lie it lies somewhere in between.

A long light robe, sulphur-coloured, clung to the sleeper from low throat to ankle; bands of narrow nolana-blue ribbon crossed her breast and were brought together in a loose cincture about her waist; her white, smooth feet were sandalled; one arm was curved beneath her lustrous head; the other lay relaxed and drooping. Chrysoberyls, the sea-virgins of stones, sparkled in her hair and lay in the bosom of her gown like dewdrops in an evening primrose. ("The Accursed Cordonnier")

Stephen's heart was big to bursting with the violence of his grief, yet even as he looked distractedly from side to side his mind told him that there was something amiss, the more so as the cheering had now almost entirely died away. The whaler had a huge spread of canvas aboard, far too great a press of sail for her possibly to enter the lagoon: she was tearing along with a great bow-wave and she sped past the mouth of the farther channel. A cable's length beyond the Opening her main and fore topgallantmasts carried clean away, as though brought down by a shot, and she instantly hauled to the wind, striking her colours as she did so. Her pursuer came racing into sight round the southern cape, studdingsails aloft and alow on either side—a dead silence from the motionless Norfolks below—fired a full, prodigal broadside to leeward, lowered down a boat and began to reduce sail, cheering like a ship clean out of her mind with delight. 'She is the Surprise,' said Stephen, and he whispered, 'The joyful Surprise, God and Mary be with her.

On his last voyage he had seemed on the brink of success and had stood in the prow reciting a grand poem of his own composition to a dim blue promontory in which he recognized one of the capes of Greenland. But it is idle to deny that the general feeling was dampened somehow, when they discovered it was the Cape of Good Hope. In short, the admiral was one of those who keep the world young.

Whilst the food we eat nowadays has much to be grateful to the likes of Marco Polo, Alexander the Great and Vasco De Gama, who would have introduced the tangy flavours of South Africa’s Rainbow Cuisine on his way around the Cape of Good Hope to India, Arabic cuisine, with spices of cinnamon, cloves, saffron and ginger was a lot more enterprising than Western cooking at the time. The medley of colours that the spices offered the food had mystical meanings to the Arabs

I exhausted myself trying to take it all in, noting every little variation and departure from how things were supposed to be. My notion of home and everything in it as ideal, archetypal, was being overthrown. It was as though the definitions of all the words in my vocabulary were expanding at once. Cape Breton was much like Newfoundland, yet everything seemed slightly off. Light, colours, surface textures, dimensions – objects like telegraph poles, fence posts, mail boxes, which you would think would be the same everywhere, were bigger or smaller or wider by a hair than they were back home. That I was able to detect such subtle differences made me realize how circumscribed my life had been, how little of the world I had seen.

He saw a chamber, broad and low, designed, in its every rich stain of picture and slumberous hanging, to appeal to the sensuous. And here the scent was thick and motionless. Costly marqueterie; Palissy candlesticks reflected in half-concealed mirrors framed in embossed silver; antique Nankin vases brimming with pot-pourri; in one comer a suit of Milanese armour, fluted, damasquinee, by Felippo Negroli; in another a tripod table of porphyry, spectrally repeating in its polished surface the opal hues of a vessel of old Venetian glass half filled with some topaz-coloured liqueur - such and many more tokens of a luxurious aestheticism wrought in the observer an immediate sense of pleasurable enervation. He noticed, with a swaying thrill of delight, that his feet were on a padded rug of Astrakhan - one of many, disposed eccentrically about the yellow tassellated-marble floor; and he noticed that the sole light in the chamber came from an iridescent globed lamp, fed with some fragrant oil, that hung near an alcove traversed by a veil of dark violet silk. ("The Accursed Cordonnier")

For, as on the coloured canvas Subtle pencils softly blend Dark and light in such proportions That the dim perspectives end- Now perhaps like famous cities, Now like caves or misty capes, For remoteness ever formeth Monstrous or unreal shapes... So it was, while I alone, Saw their bulk and vast proportions But their form remained unknown. First they seemed to us uplifting High in heaven their pointed towers, Clouds that to the sea descended, To conceive in sapphire showers What they would bring forth in crystal. And this fancy seemed more true, As from their untold abundance They, methought, could drink the blue Drop by drop. Again sea monsters Seemed to us the wandering droves, Which, to from the train of Neptune, Issued from their green alcoves. For the sails, when lightly shaken, Fanned by zephyrs as by slaves, Seemed to us like outspread pinions Fluttering o'er the darkened waves; Then the mass, approaching nearer, Seemed a mighty Babylon, With its hanging gardens pictures By the streamers fluttering down. But at last our certain vision Undeceived, becoming true, Showed it was a great armada For I saw the prows cut through Foam....

He was wearing his shimmering cape now, its magical colours cascading up and down his graceful form, and his wide-brimmed hat, hugely plumed with the feathers of a diatryma, a great flightless Underdark bird, adorned his clean-shaven head. A slender sword dancing beside one hip and long dirk on the other were his only visible weapons, but those who knew the sly mercenary realized that he possessed many more than that, concealed on his person, but easily retrieved if the need arose.

It was an act of God, many alleged, that the three Saltwood children were absent when assassins struck. They were trekking in the Great Karroo with a Hottentot family, gathering ostrich plumes for sale in Paris. When they returned, their parents were already buried, and there was heated discussion as to what should happen to them. Some said they should be freighted down to Grahamstown on the next wagon heading south, but word was received that they were not wanted there. So there was some talk of sending them along to LMS headquarters in Cape Town, but they already had a flood of Coloured orphans and abandoned children. It would be quite improper to ship them off to England, where their ancestry would damn them. Put simply, there was no place for them. No one felt any responsibility for the offspring of what from the start had been a disastrous marriage. So the children were left with the Hottentots with whom they had hunted ostrich plumes. For a few years they would be special, for the older ones could read and write, but as time passed and the necessity for marriage arrived, they would slide imperceptibly into that amorphous, undigestible mass of people called Coloured.

This rocky peninsula is truly a very wild and unworldlike little territory, jutting boldly out as it does into the mighty bay of Massachusetts, and commanding a view of its whole extent, from Cape Cod to Cape Anne, together with the many islands, towns, and villages scattered along the coast; whilst in front spreads out the Atlantic Ocean. To sit within the upper gallery of this house upon the cliff, and watch the rising moon fling her golden bridge from the far horizon's edge, until it seems to rest upon the beach below, is a sight which would be worth something in a poet or a painter's eyes. I never, either in the East or in the Mediterranean, beheld anything exceed in colour the glory of these evening skies, or their depth by night. Round about, near to the edge of the cliffs, are scattered a number of dwellings, built in the style of the southern cottage, having low projecting eaves covering a broad gallery which usually encircles the building: these are objects upon which the eye is pleased to rest when the moon deepens their shadows on the barren rock.

St-Joseph-Du-Moine and Chéticamp in Cape Breton are awash with natural beauty. Little else is as powerful and moving as its setting sun, the particular scent of the ocean, or the mountains wrapped in multi-coloured fabric. Some who grow up here tend to remain, raising their families, generation after generation. Those who don’t want to leave but must to find work, often yearn to come home, returning for the occasional weekend, a few weeks’ vacation, to summer homes, or to retire in order to satisfy their yearning to stay connected to their roots and to the land. This place lures outsiders too; they come to witness the landscape or even to make their homes in our Acadian niche. In my novel, Laura’s Story, Laura leaves the village as a young girl, but as she grows older, she longs for her home and feels a distinct pull to reconnect to her native village of Chéticamp. What is it about home that holds us there or beckons us to return?

IV-132. Of Eden, where delicious Paradise, / Now nearer, Crowns with her enclosure green, / As with a rural mound the champain head IV-135. Of a steep wilderness, whose hairie sides / With thicket overgrown, grottesque and wilde, IV-137. Access deni'd; and over head up grew / Insuperable highth of loftiest shade, / Cedar, and Pine, and Firr, and branching Palm / A Silvan Scene, and as the ranks ascend / Shade above shade, a woodie Theatre IV-142. Of stateliest view. Yet higher then thir tops / The verdurous wall of paradise up sprung: IV-144. Which to our general Sire gave prospect large / Into his neather Empire neighbouring round. IV-146. And higher then that Wall a circling row / Of goodliest Trees loaden with fairest Fruit, / Blossoms and Fruits at once of golden hue / Appeerd, with gay enameld colours mixt: IV-150. On which the Sun more glad impress'd his beams / Then in fair Evening Cloud, or humid Bow, / When God hath showrd the earth; so lovely seemd IV-153. That Lantskip: And of pure now purer aire / Meets his approach, and to the heart inspires / Vernal delight and joy, able to drive / All sadness but despair: now gentle gales / Fanning thir odoriferous wings dispense IV-158. Native perfumes, and whisper whence they stole IV-159. Those balmie spoiles. As when to them who saile / Beyond the Cape of Hope, and now are past / Mozambic, off at Sea North-East windes blow / Sabean Odours from the spicie shoare / Of Arabie the blest, with such delay / Well pleas'd they slack thir course, and many a League / Chear'd with the grateful smell old Ocean smiles.

Even now, where most kings would be dressed simply for travel, Lemuel Torrien was dressed in robes of greenish-blue silk jacquard, braided golden cord and sewn pearls—hand-selected patterns and colours for his eyes, and the inky black hair flowing over his shoulders like water. Atop the robes, he wore a brocade cape with sleeves billowing all the way to his wrists, where the fabric was tightly bound under cuffs of pure gold. Rings adorned his fingers—diamond and emerald and black opal. The sight of the excess incensed Nara. How had they enjoyed luxury as their allies faced such strife? As their son’s family faltered?

Even now, where most kings would be dressed simply for travel, Lemuel Torrien was dressed in robes of greenish-blue silk jacquard, braided golden cord and sewn pearls—hand-selected patterns and colours for his eyes, and the inky black hair flowing over his shoulders like water. Atop the robes, he wore a brocade cape with sleeves billowing all the way to his wrists, where the fabric was tightly bound under cuffs of pure gold. Rings adorned his fingers—star sapphire and emerald and black opal. The sight of the excess incensed Nara. How had they enjoyed luxury as their allies faced such strife? As their son’s family faltered?

I have always been honest with you, Ros. I invited you into my world, into my family home. I didn’t do it to make you feel guilty. I did it because I’m trying to love you.’ ‘I didn’t tell you about my family, because I am trying to love you back,’ I said. ‘That makes no sense, Ros.’ ‘It does make sense if you think about it. Love is the easy part of this equation, Paris, don’t you see. I love your face. I love your personality. I love your company. I love talking to you.’ ‘But,’ he interjected. ‘But, no matter how much I love you, I know that we will always be divided by the colour fence.' ‘Apartheid is ending, Ros.’ ‘You know as well as I do that the philosophical divide will remain long after it is physically removed.

I sat opposite my parents and scrutinised them like strangers. I wondered why I saw things so differently. Rules were supposed to be good, but this colour rule seemed bad. The clatter of a tray jolted me out of my thoughts. Our jolly, black waitress didn’t seem to mind that she could work, but not dine, in the Wimpy. I entwined my arms like a straitjacket across my chest, and thought of all the years I had been oblivious to the colour rule. I felt foolish. Deceived. My mind reeled like a fishing line in deep waters.

Paris looked me in the eye — as if he could, and desired to, see beyond the colour of my skin... ‘Can I ask you something personal, Ros?’ ‘Of course.’ ‘I’ve always wanted to ask a white person this question, but never had the chance.’ ‘Ask away,’ I said. ‘Was there a moment when you discovered apartheid and questioned it, or was it something you never thought about?’ I told Paris about the day in 1982 when I saw the Whites Only sign outside the Wimpy Bar and questioned my mother. ‘What did she say?’ ‘She translated it into a rule that I must accept and obey.’ ‘And?’ ‘And, I refused to eat my food in protest.’ He wiped his hands, pushed his chair back and stood beside me. I looked up at him like I would the Umhlanga lighthouse. ‘Stand up, Ros.’ I stood up and faced him. He held my face in his hands and said, ‘I knew you were special.’ ‘I’m not special,’ I said. ‘I have spent my whole life criticising apartheid, but doing very little to change anything.’ ‘Tula,’ he said, ‘you knew right from wrong and you had the courage to speak up.’ ‘Fat lot of good it did.

There was a river, the Rio Diamante, abounding in gold and precious stones. The city took two days to cross and had a single entrance defended by a drawbridge. The buildings were of dressed stone, the doors studded with jewels; the ploughshares were of silver, and the furniture of the humblest dwelling of silver and gold. There was no sickness; old people died as if sleep had come upon them. The men wore tricorn hats, blue coats and yellow capes (in Indian mythology the colours of the Supreme Being). They cultivated pepper and the leaves of their radishes were so big you could tether a horse to them.

Echoing Nöin’s words, he wrote: ‘The spring mist filled the sky and, in spite of myself, the gods filled my heart with a yearning to cross the Shirakawa barrier.’ There were no surly border guards and no crowds of travellers when I finally reached the barrier — no merchants in sedan chairs, no daimyo on horseback with retinues of foot soldiers and servants and porters; no pilgrims, no priests; no ladies in palanquins or travellers in capes and straw hats, like the colourful figures in Hokusai’s woodblock prints. In fact, I nearly walked straight past it along the rough country road.

Despite the fact that she was probably nearer forty than thirty, her radiance and beauty outshone that of the prettiest wahine. Statuesque, her golden skin was unblemished, and beneath the colourful cape that hung from her graceful shoulders her body was, in Nicholas’s opinion, perfection personified.