The AIDS Pandemic in Context in Beauty's Gift Kiara-Leigh Fenn College

The Aids pandemic has spurred so much commentary in South Africa that its true, startling impact can sometimes be overlooked: is easy to forget that approximately 5,38 million people are living with HIV and that an average of 1100 people die of Aids each day (Statistical Release 3) (“AIDS FactFile” 2010). Aids too many is a disease that is heard about and is not truly understood. Sindiwe Magona’s novel, Beauty’s Gift, provides life-like situations of problems that Aids causes in South Africa. This essay will discuss Sindiwe Magona’s approach to Aids in the novel and how aspects such as funerals, polygamy and the Xhosa marriage, and the ignorance of men in the Xhosa culture contributed to the effect of Aids and the South African context described in the novel.

Sindiwe Magona uses an extremely blunt and forward approach to Aids in Beauty’s Gift. She hides neither facts nor truth and has little embarrassment in confronting the problems concerning Aids. Margaret von Klemperer says on Sindiwe Magona’s approach to the Aids pandemic, “She obviously feels people must speak out on the Aids issue because only if the stigma is removed and the disease can be talked about openly, can it be controlled.” (“The Witness” Web). She does this...