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FOR YOU DEPARTED by Alan Paton

FOR YOU DEPARTED

By

Pub Date: Oct. 1st, 1969
Publisher: Scribners

Something has gone, but something also remains""--thus in discontinuous diary form the memories of his wife Dorrie from the time when he first met her on a tennis court through more than thirty years of marriage. She died after along illness (cancer, emphysema) but her fear of death was never overcome. The purgative journal here records the ""halcyon"" days; a brief lapse--his, and her loyalty to a dead husband as for marly years she wore his wedding ring; several sessions of angry and unsporting behavior playing a game called ""reformatory bridge""; the years at Diepkloof Reformatory; his thoughts on colour and polities in South Africa; and many prayers and benedictions --""the lights along a dark and sorrowful road."" Essentially private, there may be a certain inspirational value for others--a requiem of grief and gratitude admixed with sentiment.