The ruling Afrikaner National Party―many of its leaders and members had supported the Nazis in the Second World War―was firming its grip on the country in the face of black resistance.
Yet Goldblatt was drawn not to the events of the time but to “the quiet and commonplace where nothing ‘happened’ and yet all was contained and immanent.” Art critic Ivor Powell charts the outraged reaction of the Afrikaner media towards photos that showed rural Afrikaners at a time when the Afrikaner elite was trying to establish itself on the international stage, as well as his own reaction to the original book: “It was all but incandescent with tension and revelation, with a sense of souls being held up to scrutiny, of skins being peeled away.”.
The ruling Afrikaner National Party―many of its leaders and members had supported the Nazis in the Second World War―was firming its grip on the country in the face of black resistance
