In this coming-of-age story by Doris Lessing, the fifteen-year-old son of an Afrikaner farmer is so confident in his physical prowess and invincibility that every morning, before his parents wake up, he sneaks out of his house and goes hunting alone. One day he witnesses a negative side to hunting when he comes across a young buck with a broken leg suffering as it is devoured by ants. The experience teaches him that for anyone, including himself, death can come at any time. Themes include hubris, the harsh reality of nature, mortality.
An interesting question is why the death of the buck affects the boy so deeply. He has clearly not only witnessed the death of animals before but also dispensed it while hunting. One reason may be being up close to the animal’s suffering. In hunting, he would always have been able to put an injured animal out of its misery. Another may be the recollection of what he had been doing a short time earlier…
He ran in great leaping strides, and shouted as he ran, feeling his body rise into the crisp rushing air and fall back surely on to sure feet; and thought briefly, not believing that such a thing could happen to him, that he could break his ankle any moment, in this thick tangled grass.
Any such accident could easily have made him the next meal for the ant colony.