Satirical look at new SA
MISCHIEF A.A.K Masson Loot.co.za (R173) Porcupine Press
A.A.K Masson takes aim at the republic of South Africa in his lavish first novel, MisChief. It is 2019 and the general election looms just as the backbone of the ANC leadership has jumped ship and run off, with millions of rand following Jacob Zuma abroad. ANC presidential candidate, billionaire Morgan Mwane, is in the process of the relocation of his son, Mandla, to South Africa for campaign reasons, only for his private jet to crash in the build-up to the elections. Mandla, who has been living the high life in Paris, must leave his lifestyle of champagne, cocaine and rent boys behind to run for president in his father’s stead. What follows is a Zapiro meets Jason Bourne political satire that leaves one in a drunken haze.
Masson’s South Africa is one that capitalises on a current global trend of absurdity and makes sure to deliberately locate it within that environment.
Mandla Mwane leads an extravagant existence among extravagantly written characters. Characters in MisChief don’t just have one drink – they have five.
They don’t just own a farm – they own hectares of ranches littered with spotted hyenas that prefer human flesh. Very little is left to the imagination – apart from the vast gaps left by the narrative leaps that repeatedly occur until the story eventually begins to run on its own.
Masson paints the political landscape an uncomplicated colour in order to facilitate his story. Offwhite, if you will.
Compounded by the fact that Julius Malema and the EFF have left the country, for no good reason at all, leaving a wide berth for Mwane’s story to roll spectacularly out of control.
Masson hones in on the infamous reign of tender-politics in the era of democracy. He creates a simple sandcastle to kick over in this story by moulding it exclusively in the shape of the ANC.
The party receive an unrelenting barrage of swipes and even have a couple of swearwords dedicated to a particular ex-leader.
Masson certainly leaves a simpler task for himself in his depiction of a nation continuously shackled by the legacy of economic inequality and poor social cohesion.
What this simplistic illustration of South African society offers the reader is a sense of relief, coupled with a laugh or two, that maybe this pesky corruption business is the only thing wrong with this country.
The work of fiction, framed as political satire, is found lacking in that regard. The only thing successfully satirised through the insistently cynical prose is the lens through which the white minority in South Africa perceives the post-apartheid regime.