The Dancing and the Death on Lemon Street

by Denis Hirson

Violence rendered things visible, writes Denis Hirson in this beautifully crafted, musical story, which is as much about seeing how people lived at that time as it is about desire, loneliness and the desperate, blind need for revenge. Lemon street runs downslope through a leafy, peaceful suburb of Johannesburg. It is early 1960. One resident of the street, a young widow, believes she has finally met the new man of her life. In a narrow room at the back of the garden, her maid impatiently awaits the arrival of her lover. Across the street, while his parents engage in yet another heated argument, a schoolboy dreams of a girl. And down past the willow trees at the bottom of the street this girl's mother prepares a party to celebrate her twentieth wedding anniversary, which will hardly turn out as she expected. Meanwhile, tremors run through South Africa. Hundreds of men die in the great Clydesdale mine disaster. There is an assassination attempt upon the Prime Minister, Dr Verwoerd. There is the Sharpeville Massacre, which will radically shape the political climate of the country, and permanently alter the lives of certain people on Lemon Street.

268 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2011

Reviews

[Kayla · Rating 2 out of 5]

I had no idea what was going on, or actually I felt like nothing was going on at all. I realize that this novel is meant to be very literary and that a highly structured plot was not part of the bargain, but I just couldn't get into it and gave it up with a hundred pages still to go. Two stars for prose alone: it had some fairly beautiful passages. I am sure that people more clued up myself would probably enjoy this book, I was just unable to.