The waste land
The Waste Land" by Alan Paton Describe a surprising ending and analyse how it links to the rest of the text.

“The Waste Land” by Alan Paton, is about a man who is on a bus. When he gets off the bus, he is attacked by several young men and it is suggested that the men want his purse which contained his wages. This short story has a surprising ending and it helps the reader understand other parts of the text that foreshadowed the ending.

“The Waste Land” is very surprising as it ends with the man’s son having been killed in the incident. The short story ends with the narrator realizing that one of the men that have just attacked him was in fact his very own son and that he has just killed his son. When the gang dumps Freddy’s body under the lorry, where the man is, the man moved away from the body as if not wanting to accept his son’s death. The narrator displays the father’s shock and mental agony.

This ending is linked to the title as “The Waste Land” suggests that the setting is very desolate, people are desperate and that the people will do anything to help themselves in their time of need even betray their own family. This is shown when the man says “People, arise! The world is dead.” This illustrates how the defender thinks that the world is corrupt. The attackers having waited for him by the bus stop shows that they knew that he would be there thus supports his son having a part in the gang. The ending is foreshadowed by the gang waiting for him to arrive, which shows that they knew that he was coming. Also it is linked to the line “his children made fatherless” as this is use of irony, as actually the father is made childless. Also death is foreshadowed by the convent that would not “open before a man was dead” and the “bodies of old cars.”

All in all, “The Waste Land” by Alan Paton has a very surprising ending in which the