Customer Reviews

Fiela's Child

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

There is so much to be learned and so much to be absorbed inwhen reading Fiola's Child. The perfect love and acceptance between amother and a child, although different races, the still-presiding conflicts between the black and white race, the need we all have as human beings to understand who we really are, the wreched and empty lives gained by those who take and do not give, and the heartfelt passion between a man and woman, thought at once to be siblings. The plot is thick, and the end is thought provoking. I think somebody should make a movie from this book. It's truly a must-read.

It is a book that brings back the disharmony and racialistic view of the Whites aginst the Coloureds. And in this point of view we see the struggle of a Coloured mother protecting the safety and haven of her White child like a tigeress over her cub. This is a book about romance, about the individual hearts and philosophies; it is also about greed and chauvinism, yet most importantly Fiela's Child is centered and wrapped in but one word - love. The love of Benjamin over Fiela and Nina, Elias' love over money, the love of Nina towards nature and many more. Those who are sentimentalists and with a touch of feminism in them, you will experience a world so real and yet with such illuminated beauty.

Dalene Matthee has long been regarded as one of the masters of the (Afrikaans) Romantic Novel. When we were given Fiela se Kind (English translation: Fiela's Child) as a setwork, I like most students viewed the book with trepidation. After 10 pages, I went and bought myself a copy of the book.

This is the story of a white baby, abandoned by his natural parents, who is found and 'adopted' by a Coloured woman (Fiela), who raises the child, Benjamin, as her own. It explores the joys of Benjamin's childhood, the education that he gets from Fiela (so very different to what he would have got in a white household), and eventually the heartbreak when he is torn away from the only mother he has, and is given to a white wood cutter, who claims that Benjamin is his child who went missing in the forest.

This is a story told with a great sensitivity of the life styles of the people who inhabited the Cape in the mid 1800's. It is a compelling book, heartwrenching at times, humerous at times, but always, it gives the reader a feel for what was happening in the hearts of the people involved. The Characters may come across as being very simple, but that is the essence of the book. Fiela's simple, but pure, love for her child, the woodcutter's simple, but hard way of life, and Benjamin's simple non-understanding of why he was taken away from the woman he loved, and given to a man he hated. His lack of understanding that he is "better" than Fiela because he is white, and she isn't, and his stuggle to adjust to a new and totally unfamiliar set of rules.

This book could be described a bit like a prison, because once it gets hold of you, it doesn't let go, not until it has finished with you, and not you with it

I am currently in 11th grade and had to read this book for school. I must say, this is the best book I have ever read for school, I'd give it a 95%. It was so emotional that it put me in a funk for an entire day after reading it. Everything was described in such great detail that it came alive; and the characters were excellent, particularly Benjamin, Nina, and Selling. All the episodes in the book were great, particularly the final scenes where Benjamin had to sort out his feelings for Nina. The only flaw I felt the book had is that I wish it would've had more of a resolution with the whole Nina affair at the end, but this is only a minor flaw in this great book.

I read this book last when I was in Dar-Es-Salaam, Tanzania, for my English class. I loved it, and could not put it down.
Reading how Benjaman lives with Fiela and her family and then is suddenly thrust into his 'real' family, the Van Rooyens, and having to go through the struggles of finding out who he is, versus who others see him as. I loved how intense it got when he moved in with the Van Rooyins, and was coming to grips with being called Lukas, instead of Benjiman.
If you like this book, you also might like the book written by an African-American woman named Octavia Butler, who wrote a book entitled "Kindred". It is similar as far as how the whites treated the blacks, and how segragation was so apparent .

This is one of the three books that I had to study for during my O-levels two years ago. I think that this book is absolutely fabulous with many heart wrenching parts, for example when Benjamin is taken away from Fiela and her loving family and given to the cruel Elias or when Benjamin finally gets the truth out from Barta the he is indeed not her son. The author also beautifully describes the feelings of the different characters, like the guilt that Benjamin felt when he realises that he loves his "sister" Nina in a romantic way. A must read for everyone!

This is a wonderful novel of South Africa. It is about Fiela, an African woman who takes in a white foundling. Is this child the lost son of white forest people? Did he wander over the mountains to Fiela's home? What is love and what constitutes family? The child is taken from Fiela a given "back" to the forest people. The question still remains" Is he really theirs?

The story is haunting in all aspects - - the characterizations, the detailed scenes of beauty describing South Africa's terrain, animals and people, and in its evocations of the emotions each character feels and is drawn into.
As Ben, the white child, grows up, he must confront his life and roots as his very future depends on it.

Refreshing to find teachers suggesting books that are written in other languages and then translated into English. Also nice, that it opens a child's view to a different experience.

This book was awesome! The story was very well written and kept me wanting to read more all the way to the end. Even the elephants had character! This is definitely a must read.

This is one of the great novels of the 20th century. You can read the description, or other reviews to get a sense of the story, but believe me it will transport you directly into the hearts and minds of people scrabbling a living in a unique place and time that is astonishing in its contrasts. If given the choice, I'd choose a life with Fiela; it's fictional characters like hers that change the real world. A must read!