The Dream House – Themes, Symbols, and Characters
● Message:
○ reconfigure the past in a new form. Build on a nation of heritage
○ -investigate the past and its prejudices. Only once you understand the past
you can shape the future
● The Durban house has a light that their farmhouse has never had and energy that far
surpasses that of the Dwaleni house. - Patricia's dream house. “Always made her blood
sing.”
● The relationship between Patricia and Looksmart is hard to navigate as they both
have very different opinions as to how things in the past occurred.
● ‘Liberal white’ (i.e Patricia) have this belief that if they take in a domestic worker’s
child and give them things their parents can’t then they’ll feel better
● “It is a story of secrets, the hold of the past, of how our lives can be twisted and torn and
stretched beyond what we think we can bear. And yet we do”
Themes
1. Loss and pain: pain comes in many two forms emotional and physical. All the
characters have something to mourn over and they all experience pain (some pain
greater than the other.)
○ Patricia - experiences the loss of her child and in some way, she feels that she
had ‘lost’ Looksmart as she felt that he had almost become her second child.
○ Bheki - ‘lost’ the opportunity to have a ‘normal’ life with his son because of
his sickness.
○ Richard - suffers from the loss of his mind. He has lost his rationality (not that
● Message:
○ reconfigure the past in a new form. Build on a nation of heritage
○ -investigate the past and its prejudices. Only once you understand the past
you can shape the future
● The Durban house has a light that their farmhouse has never had and energy that far
surpasses that of the Dwaleni house. - Patricia's dream house. “Always made her blood
sing.”
● The relationship between Patricia and Looksmart is hard to navigate as they both
have very different opinions as to how things in the past occurred.
● ‘Liberal white’ (i.e Patricia) have this belief that if they take in a domestic worker’s
child and give them things their parents can’t then they’ll feel better
● “It is a story of secrets, the hold of the past, of how our lives can be twisted and torn and
stretched beyond what we think we can bear. And yet we do”
Themes
1. Loss and pain: pain comes in many two forms emotional and physical. All the
characters have something to mourn over and they all experience pain (some pain
greater than the other.)
○ Patricia - experiences the loss of her child and in some way, she feels that she
had ‘lost’ Looksmart as she felt that he had almost become her second child.
○ Bheki - ‘lost’ the opportunity to have a ‘normal’ life with his son because of
his sickness.
○ Richard - suffers from the loss of his mind. He has lost his rationality (not that
