The body of Paulus is taken to the local morgue, and when his family cannot afford to pay for a funeral, the undertaker suggests they sell one of their goats to cover the costs. This act symbolizes the economic struggles faced by the poor and the devaluation of a poor person's life.
The story begins with the narrator describing his suburban-style life on the farm. The conflict arises when Petrus , one of the workers, informs the narrator that his brother—who had walked all the way from Rhodesia (modern-day Zimbabwe) to find work—has died in one of the farm huts. six feet of the country by nadine gordimer summary
One evening, their Black employee, Petrus, comes to them in distress. Petrus’s younger brother, who had recently arrived from the countryside looking for work, has died suddenly from pneumonia. The brother was not legally registered to be in the urban area, and as a result, the authorities have buried him in an unmarked, common pauper’s grave—a "six feet of the country"—outside the town’s official cemetery. The body of Paulus is taken to the