Die gebruik van die mite in Die werfbobbejaan van Alexander Strachan

Abstract

The use of myths in Die werfbobbejaan by Alexander Strachan
This article focuses on the rote of Zulu myths in Alexander Strachan’s novel Die werfbobbejaan. It lakes as point of departure sources on mythology like Cuddon (1991), Baldick (1990), Grimal (1969), Levi-Strauss (1979) and Jung (1969). Die werfbobbejaan essentially recounts the story of a man (the adventurer, the academic, the writer, the hunter) who also is the central character in Strachan's two preceding novels. Die werfbobbejaan focuses on the completion of an individuation process in the life of the central character, a process already begun in the preceding two novels and which in this novel finally culminates in the confrontation between hunter and baboon. The completion of this process is facilitated by the African milieu of Zululand where people give meaning to their existence by means of myths, and where no distinction is made between the mythic and rational modes of experiencing reality.