BY JACK HOFFMANN
Jack Hoffman is a retired surgeon. He is the author of the novel He Does Not Die A Death Of Shame, which relates the dilemmas of a young Jew growing up in apartheid South Africa.
In the opening pages of his book of memoirs, Dr David Bass reveals to us that he is dyslexic. Yet within a few lines, it becomes clear that he is most certainly not dysgraphic. The opposite is true.
Bass has produced a gem of a book. The work is beautifully constructed and written in fluent, unostentatious prose. The author peppers his stories with delightful metaphors and similes: An ancient telephone has “ten beady eyes and bulbous ears”. He encounters student politics “like a tone-deaf person seated behind a pillar at an orchestral recital.” He describes “an olive-green cargo vest with more pouches than a kangaroo park.”
He writes with wry, self-deprecating humour, moving effortlessly between lightness and gravity. He brings tears to the reader’s eyes with tales of bereavement, regret, and compassion, and of himself as a misunderstood, undiagnosed child left to his own devices with reading difficulties.
We are taken back to the middle of the last century, to the dystopian world of apartheid South Africa, a society so different from today’s that the stories read like fiction. But they are not. The author assures us that every story is true.
Bass recalls vestiges of bygone days: Hillman cars, Bakelite telephones, aerogrammes, trunk calls, and intercontinental transport on ocean liners.
We are taken on a roller-coaster ride from despair to joy, from a near-death experience to resurrection, from narrow, lonely childhood pathways to the broad, forked highways of adulthood.
He shows us snippets of the life of his father, a classic, old-fashioned GP who, on call 24 hours a day until the age of 85, devoted his life to his patients – a life directed by the peremptory ringing of an ancient telephone.
The book does not shy away from the moral complexities of apartheid. The author depicts its iniquities and relates how a privileged white generation either ignored its reality, were blind to it, or, with a shrug of the shoulder, regarded it merely as the natural order. He describes the anomalous, paradoxical phenomenon of black nannies serving as surrogate mothers to white children while their own children were fostered by others. We read of the painful syndrome, then endemic among South African Jews: generations splintered and families dispersed across the globe by emigration.
In other chapters, Bass agonises over his inability to save an eminent senior colleague from his occult psychiatric problems. We are taken to a raucous Jewish wedding with ominous undertones. We meet a suffering mother fighting the system that has crippled her son; a pathological liar among the magnificent flowers of Namaqualand; a spaced-out scavenger of used condoms
who rekindles the author’s musical career.
Many surgeons are arrogantly self-confident, egocentric, and vain. Why would they not be? Who else has licence to invade our bodies, reveal our secrets, and rearrange our organs?
Dr Bass is a surgeon, but he displays none of these traits. He is humble, self-effacing, compassionate, and empathetic. He focuses on his failures rather than his accomplishments. Yet, despite his fine achievements in more than one sphere, he describes his life as “unremarkable”.
His family, not fame or fortune, is his sanctuary.
At the end of his book, Bass asks, “What will become of us if we no longer exist in the memory of others?”
Bass’s memoir ensures that he will long continue to exist in the memory of others. He is a remarkable man and a fine writer. His stories deserve a wide readership.
I have only one negative remark about this book: It is about 400 pages too short!
The book is available from Amazon on Kindle and in paperback.
- For the current edition of the Cape Jewish Chronicle, click here.
- Subscribe to the Cape Jewish Chronicle: R450/year, or R38/month via debit order. Simply email us at subscriptions@ctjc.co.za and click here for payment info.
- The Cape Jewish Chronicle reaches over 6 000 readers monthly across print and digital platforms.
- To book advertising space or discuss a custom package contact Adéle Gradner Mobile: 083 321 5222 | Office: 021 464 6736 | Email advertising@ctjc.co.za
