Long search in a new world

HEARTLAND: A Parable, by Charles Fivaz. 2010. 103pp.

Reviewed by Bob Berry

Deep inside all of us, whether Christian or of other faiths, there is a continuing need to search for truth, unconsciously making a journey towards the spiritual source of life. Such a journey is one of the several themes that run through this thought-provoking book which, although set in a fictional future world, is much more than a work of fiction.

It is the essence of a dream, expressing the author’s deeply felt desire that today’s ecumenical movements must overcome the denominational boundaries that keep Christians apart and advance the impetus towards unity and overcoming prejudice. Parables, says author Charles Fivaz, are like dreams. “When you’ve had a significant dream you’ve told yourself a story, and when you tell someone else that story or write it down, you realise it’s about some aspect of your life that needs attention right now. The dream is a fiction narrative but it is a ‘true’ story.”

The setting is rural Australia in the 22nd century. After the collapse of industrial society, the world has returned to a basic simple farming way of life, clinging to  some traditions that survived the old era. Despite such radical changes, however, there are still strong divisions among peoples — in thought, culture, ethics and belief — as humanity continues on its usual course.

The location could be a quiet agricultural way of life anywhere in the world, but the Aussie link is not surprising: the author is an expatriate South African ex-seminarian living in Melbourne. He studied for the priesthood in Cape Town from 1985-88 and is a former contributor to The Southern Cross. Today his life in Australia is very much bound up with the ecumenical ideal: the search for a common identity which is the thread running through the story.

After the death of her mother the young girl Hannah leaves home and treks through the countryside in search of her mother’s origins. Her community decides  she is missing, presumed drowned. But her father Adam refuses to accept this and goes in search of her.

Their  geographic world is  divided into huge farms with vast inhospitable distances in-between. Daughter and father are in fact searching for new meaning in their lives. It is a moving story of hardship and a time of trial and change for both.

The wilderness has its direct parallel in the Australian Outback with its mystical dreamtime exemplified in Hannah’s meetings with the Aborigine Wedjeegle who helps her find purpose in her life with his fascinating creationist stories of how water came to the Earth. Adam also finds spiritual calm and a new dimension in his search for peace inside as he follows his daughter from farm to farm and through barren wilderness, in the process gaining insight into her resourcefulness and courage.

Heartland is well-written and has plenty of pace and tension. It is a story of anguish and of spiritual upliftment, leading the reader dramatically, chapter by chapter, through elation and then sorrow  towards a final unifying truth.

I raced through the book quickly, and then re-read it slowly. It is inspired writing and the author is indebted  for this inspiration to Samuel Clear whose courage and daring took him on an 18-month-long life-threatening pilgrimage across the world to advance the cause of Christian unity. The book is dedicated to him.

Bob Berry is a retired journalist with The Star in Johannesburg. Heartlands can be ordered from amazon.com or directly through www.heartlandaparable.com.