Best Books Study Work Guide: Dreaming of Light

Dear Grade 11 Learner
When you read Dreaming of Light, you need to interact with the text.
As you read, ask yourself what lies behind a character’s actions or words or reflect on the descriptions used by the author and the insights they provide into the emotions and feelings of the characters. Here is one example:
It troubles me when people make noise underground. These rock tunnels have their own sounds, the creaks and groans as troubling as explosions or the roar of rockfall. I imagine men’s noise competing against the earth’s voice, and the earth resenting it, and shifting to punish us. (p.24)
Questions you could ask
What lies behind Regile’s words? A possible answer is that he knows what the sounds underground mean. He has come to see the earth as a powerful force that resents men coming into its space and uses rockfalls to take revenge.
How do the descriptions used by the author help us to understand what Regile feels? They create a sense of his powerlessness and his feeling that mining operations are wrong.
There are questions on each of the chapters to help you explore the text so you find it easy to read and understand it. The more personally involved you become, the more you will get out of reading.
The pre-reading questions invite you to predict what will happen in the chapter. To be able to do that you need to combine what you know about the setting, the events so far and the characters with your own experience.
The reading questions are there to guide your reading. Just jot down quick answers. It is important not to interrupt the flow of your reading. Of course, if you find that you are not sure what is happening, you may have to re-read (skim or scan) to find what you missed or did not notice when you read that part.
The post-reading questions will help you to see whether you have understood the characters’ ­motives and the effect of their actions and remembered key incidents. Questions will not always ask you to give information that is explicitly given in the text. You will need to read between the lines (interpret) and apply information or insights to other situations. Look at the chart on page 21 for some examples.
There are also opportunities for you to try your hand at answering more formal contextual ­questions that will test how well you “know” the book.
The information in the first part of the book and at the back of the book is there to help you.
1. Overview
Dreaming of light is about the experiences of Regile and Taiba who have been trafficked into South Africa from neighbouring countries. The boys who are tricked into crossing the border are forced to work underground in an illegal mine. The novel is written from a first person perspective. The main focus is on the choices that can be made. Either to accept the situation as Regile does and voluntarily continue working, or to do all in one’s power to escape, as Taiba does. The novel is set in contemporary South Africa where illegal mining and child trafficking continues despite attempts to stop it.
The author explores a number of issues, such as corruption, child trafficking, illegal mining and physical bullying.
Title explanation
The fierce longing that Regile has for light is reflected in the description on page 34 of your copy of Dreaming of light (school edition with reading guide):
”Mostly I think about light, especially the sun’s light, but also all the other sorts of light there are. The light you get when you’re up there and outside at night – the white brightness from a big moon, or the thin smile of light when it still has to grow. The bristly points of light from stars, whole masses of them clustered close together, growing into a swirling spill like milk dropped in water. Warm orange light from candles and lamps at home. Light from an electric bulb and how you still see its shape if you stare at it and then look away.”
2. The author
Jayne Bauling started writing poetry as a shy teenager. So it was that her first work to be published was poetry. She started writing for teenagers when she moved to White River, Mbombela. As you can see from the description on page 10 of your copy of the novel and reader’s guide, she has received a number of awards for her short stories and novels.
She is strongly opposed to the abuse of children and the abuse of women and she is keenly aware of the need to conserve our environment. Another of her interests that is reflected in the novel is bird watching.
3. Background information
There are many mines in South Africa that have been abandoned because the costs of extracting gold are too high to make a profit from selling the gold. Because any disused mine is a dangerous place, barricades are put up to prevent unlawful entry. Syndicates smash down the barriers and send in zama zamas (illegal miners) to dig out the gold-bearing ore. Once the gold has been extracted it is sold on the black market. There are huge profits to be made. Many people in South Africa and its neighbouring countries are drawn into these illicit activities because of the difficulty of finding work. Although the risks are high, the money to be made is very attractive.
In southern Africa, children are trafficked for a number of reasons. One of them is that children are used as slave labour in the illegal mines. Many of the tunnels in the mines are narrow and it is difficult for grown men to use them. Agents working in other African countries on the South African borders find it easy to persuade boys at the age of about fourteen that they are ­offering short-term jobs that are very well paid. Many of these boys have fathers who are either dead or are not supporting their family. The boys feel a responsibility to become breadwinners. In a tough economic climate, the offer of a job that will pay “a man’s money” is very enticing.
The boys in this book are used as slave labour in illegal mining operations. Not only do they not get paid, they are forced to do extremely hard work and they are kept locked up when they are not underground to prevent them escaping. In fact, it would not help them to escape because they would not get far before being found and returned. Even if they did manage to evade Papa Mavuso and his friends, they would be arrested and deported because they do not have any money or identity documents.
4. Literary elements
4.1 Setting
The book is set in contemporary South Africa in a gold mine in the Barberton mountainlands that has been shut down because the costs of production are too high for the company to make a profit. A syndicate is running an illegal mining operation in one of the mines that have been closed by its legal owners.
4.2 Narrative
We see what happens through the eyes of Regile, a third person narrator. Although he has blind spots about himself and others, he is perceptive in many ways. We are thus able to gain a good understanding of the other characters. He describes what they look like, what they say, and the effect their actions have on the other characters. For instance, we have a clear description of what Katekani looks like, how she sees things and the things that matter to her. The same is true of Taiba.
From the way that Regile tells the story, it is clear that both Taiba and Katekani have a maturing influence on him. As he comes to respect, appreciate and feel a growing affection for Katekani and Taiba, Regile gains a greater understanding of himself and recovers his values.
4.3 Structure and plot
There is a difference between the story line and the plot. The story line is concerned with the sequence of events in a story (what happens in the story). The plot, on the other hand tells you why things happened or how they came about. In this novel, Regile Dlamini has survived his life as a zama zama by containing his emotions and avoiding any personal relationships. It is his chosen way of life now. The problem or conflict is introduced by Taiba who persists in talking to him about possible escape and expressing his belief that he (Regile) is a good ­person who is able to be a moral leader. Despite not wanting to become involved in Taiba’s life, ­Regile inevitably does. A complication is that Taiba and Aires sustain severe injuries as a result of a beating and the rockfall. Slowly the tension rises as a result of this complication (known as ­rising action) because Regile has to respond to Taiba and Aires’s needs as well as Taiba’s constant questions and his strong belief that rescue is possible. Regile has to make choices to resolve the problem. The tension builds up to the climax when Taiba manages to escape and Katekani is brutally beaten by her father for her role in the escape. The last part of the book describes the falling action (actions that solve the problem) and the resolution: the boys are all set free, as is Katekani.
4.4 Conflict
Conflict is associated with rising action or the building of tension.
Inner conflict arises from the problems that a character faces. In the case of Regile, the inner ­conflict is between whether to be harsh and indifferent to the recruits and to cut himself off ­from gentleness or affection, or to respond to their needs, knowing from his own experience how hard life is for them. He has learnt to control his emotions as a way of dealing with the horrors ­of ­working underground in a mine where no safety measures are taken.
Outer conflict relates to verbal or physical battles. In Dreaming of Light, this is related to the cruel treatment that Faceman and Papa Mavuso deal out to anyone whom they suspect of not being totally obedient.
4.5 Mood or atmosphere
In Dreaming of Light this ranges from a light-hearted mood when Regile and Katekani go off to town together to the harsh and sinister atmosphere underground where there is danger at every turn.
4.6 Tone
The narrator’s tone usually reflects his attitude to a particular event or emotion. In a dialogue, the speaker’s tone can do the same thing. The tone can be bitter, angry, mocking, harsh, friendly or kind, for instance.
4.7 Characterisation
Main characters
Regile and Taiba are the main characters. But Katekani can be seen as a main character, too, because she also develops in the course of the book. It is a good idea to build up a profile of each of them while you are reading the novel. The table below shows one way of doing this:
Taiba is about thirteen or fourteen years old. Along with his friend he is trafficked into South Africa from Mozambique and forced to work without pay as an illegal miner. Although the conditions are very bad and the adult miners and the men in charge are cruel and violent, he never loses hope that he will escape or be rescued and return to his family.
What is Taiba like?
How do we know?
He is optimistic.
Although he has been underground for more than two months, when he hears there are security men in the mine, his first thought is that this is a chance to be rescued.
He is determined.
Even when he has been badly injured he take his friend to safety.
When there is a rockfall, he goes to rescue his friend, even though he finds it difficult to move.

He is brave.
He angers Faceman into giving him a brutal hiding so that he can protect his friend.
He never complains about his injuries.
He is loving and caring.
He protects his friend from physical harm.
He does all he can to care for his friend once he is injured.
He is concerned.
He never gives up hope.
He constantly speaks about Spike, no matter how many times Regile tries to stop him or discourage him.
He is innocent in the sense that he continues to believe that he will find good people to rescue him despite the hard lessons he has learnt about how cruel and dishonest people ca

Caring and love

Regile and Taiba are the main characters.