The title of the memoir I am reading is called “Born a Crime” by Trevor Noah. A quote I found very significant was one that I read in chapter 2, it simply said, “I was born a crime”. That is it, but it stood out to me because it corresponds with the books title, and leads us to the overall meaning of the book.
The quote was said by the main character; Trevor Noah, but he did not directly say the quote to anyone in particular other than the audience.
The context of this quote was during a flash back to Trevor Noah’s birth in a hospital delivery room in South Africa. Trevor’s mother was having a C-Section and the nurses were surprised to remove a half-white/half-black child from her uterus. Trevor’s father (a white man) was not in the delivery room because during this day in age under the Laws of Apartheid, it was unacceptable for interracial marriage between whites and blacks to occur. With the nurses being aware of this law, they were forced to ask who and where the father was. Trevor’s mom answered that he was “from Swaziland”. The nurses figured that she was lying, but accepted it because they were forced to have an explanation.
This quote does not contain any figurative language but is significant to the story because it gives us the reason why the title is what it is and what the title means to Trevor Noah’s life and to the audience. The quote will explain how him being “born a crime” affects his life in the future as he grows up and the hardships he experiences.
This quote relates to the topic of segregation and its unjust basis. The quote reveals that Trevor Noah has experienced negative affects as soon as he was born (literally) for breaking a law that he had no choice to stop. He was a consequence of situation that he had no direct involvement in. The Law of Apartheid is unfair in the first place, but having Trevor being the one mainly affected is even more unfair.
A Day in The Life of Abby 