Effects of Apartheid in Gordimer's Burger's Daughter

Abstract

Nadine Gordimer's Burger's Daughter moves around the effects of apartheid with its impact on the political, socio-economic, moral aspects of the life of Roja Burger, the protagonist. It also has tremendous impact on the psyche of the central character. The father of Roja Burger dies in the prison being a member of privileged class family keeping struggle against the apartheid policy. The father becomes the victim of his own race policy. In this sense not only non white people suffer from various problems due to apartheid but also white people suffer from the contemporary political situation. The protagonist, Rosa Burger, a white woman who wants to locate her position in the contemporary political situation of South Africa, she becomes an orphan after her parents' death. She feels loneliness and also faces various problems while creating relationship with others. She even faces psychological, political and social problems while living in her own country as an alien, despite being a daughter from a privileged white family. She suffers from the sense of alienation, ambivalence, and segregation. That is, she suffers psychologically due to apartheid policy and her victimhood is traceable to the white legacy.