of safety. Gordimer implies that the path to true safety is to tear down the walls of apartheid and work on reconciliation.

Nadine Gordimer expresses a strong opposition to the apartheid of South Africa in her short story "Once Upon a Time."  In this story, structured like a fairy tale, Gordimer shows the detrimental effects of apartheid on those at the top of the power structure.  Gordimer's story describes a family living in a community in which they fear the invasion of the "other."  To keep their possessions safe, they and their neighborhoods put up neighborhood signs to discourage intruders with words such as "You have been warned," purchase electronic security systems, build higher fences, and install vise-like contraptions over these fences.  

All these precautions ironically result in a less safe and less attractive community.  With their tall fences, the neighborhood begins to look like a concentration camp. To protect themselves, they imprison themselves. The alarm system provides cover for thieves.  The Dragon Tooth contraption results in the death of their son.  Through this story, Gordimer shows quite clearly what an apartheid system does to those who continue to enforce it. 

But we also see more socialistic tendencies in the story.  The story itself is a frame story.  The frame is the author's writing a children's story when she is awakened and frightened by a noise she heard.  She finds out that the noise was caused by the fact that her house was built over an underground mine that had perhaps in earlier years collapsed upon and interred the workers down below.  This small detail is important because it can serve as a metaphor for Gordimer's political leanings.  The foundation of the house is shaky (like the apartheid government), and its first victims are those down below or the lower class, but eventually the tremors that have such devastating effects on the lower class will result in the collapse of the entire household or government.  In other words, when one segment of society keeps getting poorer while another segment of society keeps increasing their wealth and possessions, that society is no longer stable and will eventually fall.  A vastly uneven distribution of wealth negatively affects the entire society.  

Nadine Gordimer is a well-respected South African author. Her works caused consternation in South Africa during the Apartheid era and some of her books were banned. She became active in the banned political organisation, the African National Congress, and worked tirelessly for the upliftment of the oppressed. Once Upon A Time, a short story, is purposefully open-ended and non-specific so that it can reach and share its message with the greatest number of people. However, Gordimer''s political views are still evident in the subtle suggestions which she includes in this story. 

The narrator, considered to be Gordimer herself, expresses her indignation when a colleague suggests, that because she is a writer, she "ought" to write a children's story because every writer "ought" to. In a country with very restrictive laws, this is offensive to her, as in her professional life, she does not want to be manipulated especially when the government already tries to impose its unjust system on every South African. She also reveals, that although she is sometimes afraid, she does not feel the need for burglar bars on her windows or a "gun under the pillow" which was (sadly) a popular South African accessory during Apartheid (and to a much lesser extent today). This reveals a political stance that is anti-government and which does not make sweeping assumptions about, for example, "people of another color." 

As the narrator tells the "bedtime story," Gordimer's political views are again prominent as she reveals what people think they need to do to protect themselves. Their misguided efforts result in tragedy and so the story serves as a warning that conforming to the views of the South African government of the time, and going to extraordinary lengths to remove the apparent threat, is far more dangerous than allowing a just and fair society to emerge.

The tone of a text conveys the way the author feels about their subject. In this story, Gordimer takes racial injustice and prejudice as her subject, and she makes her judgment of apartheid apparent through statements such as "There were riots, but these were outside the city, where people of another color were quartered. These people were not allowed into the suburb except as reliable housemaids and gardeners." To say that people of a certain race are consigned to remain in a certain part of the city and that they are prohibited from even entering another part unless they do so as servants conveys Gordimer's condemnation of the South African political system. Through the text's disapproving tone, Gordimer introduces her own political views.

Further, the text's irony, that the white couple's son is horrifically injured by the very thing his parents installed in order to protect him, also conveys Gordimer's political views. The parents put in an alarm system, put bars on the windows, and build a high wall; the finishing touch is to top the wall with barbed wire coils. When the boy decides to pretend that he is a brave prince making his way through thorns, like in his fairy tale book, he is caught by the "security coil" and turned into a "bleeding mass" by its blades. The thing that was meant to protect him actually harms him greatly, and this irony helps to convey Gordimer's disapproval of apartheid and the white people who maintain it.

Nadine Gordimer's story “Once Upon a Time” does reveal something about her political point of view, though it does so indirectly and quite subtly. Let's look at how that works.

Think first of the fear the story presents. The couple in the tale is frightened that "people of another color" will come into their neighborhood and steal from them. There are, after all, riots elsewhere in the city. The husband's mother advises them to take all sorts of precautions, even though there seems to be very little real threat, at least at first. The couple puts up all kinds of gates and takes out extra insurance. Yet the fear remains.

In fact, the couple is completely driven by fear. When crime does come to their neighborhood, they do everything they can to stay safe. They put bars on the windows and install a security system and burglar alarm. Their neighbors do the same, but it backfires because the chaos caused by the alarms being triggered actually encourages more crime. Finally, the couple puts up barbed wire and metal shards on the top of their wall. But when their little boy tries to climb up, he is badly injured and dies.

Now think about the political message in this story. Hiding does not solve problems. The characters in the tale do nothing to try to change their world. They do not address the problems. They try to escape from them. And their efforts fail horribly. The author suggests that trying to escape only makes things worse, and she implies the need for direct action to make changes rather than a mere retreat into a security that does not exist.