On the Contrary: A Novel : Being the Life of a Famous Rebel, Soldier, Traveller, Explorer, Reader, Builder, Scribe, Latinist, Lover and Liar [Hardcover]

Andre Philippus Brink (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 1994

The South Africa of 1739 provides the backdrop for the picaresque escapades of wandering adventurer Estienne Barbier as he searches for a lost treasure, seduces women, fosters rebellion, and tries to deal with the hypocrisy of the colonial leaders.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

South African novelist Brink (A Dry White Season ; An Act of Terror ) seems at first to be working a much lighter, more picaresque vein here than in his usual, more overtly political fiction. The narrator is a French-born soldier of fortune, Estienne Barbier, telling of his adventures in the South Africa run by the Dutch East India Company in the 18th century (there was such a person, though Brink wryly admits that most of his story is invented; still, he adds, "One never knows"). Barbier, sentenced to death for aiding a slave girl's escape and trying to foment a revolt in Capetown, awaits execution. He spins tall tales of his adventures in the scarcely known (to Europeans) continent, and it soon becomes apparent that, like the Don Quixote he constantly evokes, many of his exploits are of the imaginary kind. Driven by a manic search for a legendary lost treasure and for a vanished slave girl, helped in moments of crisis by interior dialogues with the spirit of Joan of Arc, Barbier creates a remarkable picture of the Africa of his time, the marginal existence of the Dutch farmers, the corruption of the civic administration and the near-invisibility of the "hottentots" who then, as now, did most of the menial work. In the end, his search becomes one for justice, for himself as well as for the native inhabitants. The book can therefore be read both as an adventure yarn and as a salutary political fable. Coming as it does at a time of enormous change in South Africa, the latter is what lingers most powerfully.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

Lying in the Dark Hole awaiting execution, Estienne Barbier recounts the story of his life in 18th-century South Africa. Arriving as a soldier of fortune with the Dutch East India Company, he is buffeted by the country's penchant for extremes of cruelty, beauty, depravity, and love. Though drawn to the mysterious interior beyond the colon's border, he returns to the Cape to challenge the endemic graft and corruption that riddle the country's administration. Like his hero, Don Quixote, he is doomed the moment he tilts his lance against the status quo. Declared a fugitive, Barbier hides on the farms of accommodating widows. Finally despairing of any justice, he leads a rebellion of Afrikaners and seals his fate. On the Contrary is a masterful blend of historical detail and fanciful invention. Brink is at his best when writing of his own Afrikaans heritage.
Paul E. Hutchison, Bellefonte, Pa.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 375 pages
• Publisher: Little Brown & Co (T); 1st Am edition edition (August 1994)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0316108847
• ISBN-13: 978-0316108843
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.8 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #5,250,132 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)