Born a Crime

Patricia is Noah’s mom. Although she is a Black woman who was raised during apartheid, she exhibits Defiance of Oppression by continually resisting the convention of what a Black woman should be according to the South African government. She leaves her family in Soweto to live in the city, which was against the law during apartheid, and she has a child with a white man, something else that was strictly prohibited. During apartheid, Black women were expected to work as maids or in factories, but she knows English and took typing classes, allowing her to have a higher-paying job as a secretary. In these ways, Patricia can best be described as an independent, strong-willed woman who resists the political forces that try to tell her what to do and who to be. Although Noah is the protagonist of the autobiography, Patricia is the heroic figure.

Patricia is a devout Christian who attends church three times a day on Sunday and goes to weekly prayer meetings. She raises Noah according to what he calls "Old Testament discipline" (262), meaning that she doesn’t spare the rod or let him get away with disobedience. However, despite her disciplinary style, Patricia is fair with Noah and tries to give him the childhood she never had. She teaches him English, buys him books, and takes him places otherwise forbidden for Black people, like parks, museums, and ice-skating rinks.

Noah describes Patricia as a beautiful woman who was wild in her youth. During the height of apartheid, she frequented secret bars and nightclubs that encouraged people of all races to mingle. She is also good with money and bought two of her own houses throughout her life.

Abel is Patricia’s husband and Noah’s stepdad. He went to a technical school and is an amazing mechanic, but he is a horrible businessman. He briefly owns Mighty Mechanics, but he ends up drinking away all the profit. On the outside, he is charming with a warm smile, but secretly he is filled with violent anger. He has an addiction to alcohol, and this violence and anger comes out the most when he is drunk. He ends up physically abusing Patricia and Noah, and even his friends on rare occasions. By the end of the memoir, he attempts to murder Patricia by shooting her in the head, using his “sadness” as an excuse.

Abel never treats Noah like a son. In fact, for most of his childhood, Abel was more of a distant friend than a parental figure. However, once Noah becomes a teenager, Abel begins physically abusing Noah and any relationship they may have had disintegrates.

Robert is Noah’s biological father, but Noah has never really known him as a traditional father since apartheid kept them apart for most of his childhood. Instead, Noah and his dad met once or twice a week to share meals and talk. Despite these meetings, Noah grows up and knows little about his dad. Even when they reunite years later when Noah is an adult, he still knows little about who Robert is as a person. All that is really known about him is that he is Swiss/ German, he first came to South Africa as a businessman, he owned an interracial restaurant but was coerced by the government to shut it down, and he is a clean/ neat man. It’s also clear that he has a strong sense of duty since he was a part of Noah’s childhood, despite having no obligation to be.