The novel Cry, the Beloved Country, written by "Alan Paton", takes place in South Africa in 1946, just before the onset of apartheid, or the separation of races. As the novel demonstrates, long before the South African apartheid era, racial inequality existed. Concerning the state of racial affairs in South Africa, the novel shows the story of the Zulu pastor Stephen Kumalo and his search in Johannesburg for his son, who is accused of murdering the …showed first 75 words of 2086 total…

…showed last 75 words of 2086 total…apartheid and injustice. The racist attitude of the whites has caused the deconstruction of the tribal world to serve the white man's need. They have not bothered to replace the old system with a new one nor do they wish to accommodate the natives into the prosperous white world, in any capacity other than cheap labor. The natives are forced to live in less than equal conditions and this leads to frustration lawlessness and crime.