‘To oppose and to give to one another without sacrificing themselves’: Gifts in Damon Galgut’s The Promise

This article examines Damon Galgut’s The Promise (2021) with reference to Marcel Mauss’s gift theory (Citation1950), Jacques Derrida’s concept of différance (1992) and Erich Fromm’s notion of authentic love (1995). It argues that the novel’s central themes – land, inheritance and unfulfilled promises as gifts – reflect South Africa’s unresolved colonial and post-colonial tensions, revealing gift exchange as a mechanism of social cohesion, symbolic violence and identity formation. Through analysis of stagnated reciprocity within the narrative, the article demonstrates how Galgut critiques the failure of both intimate and national promises. The promise of a house to the black servant, Salome, exemplifies a fractured reciprocity, deferring return and perpetuating hierarchy. This deferral also embodies a negative form of différance, suspending justice and meaning. In contrast, the character Amor’s eventual act of restitution represents an attempt to complete the cycle of exchange while opening the future. Through this gesture, Amor expresses authentic love and embraces her identity as a giver. Ultimately, the article contends that a synthesis of social obligation, openness and authentic love provides an ethical framework for reimagining gift-giving. This framework offers a path toward genuine reciprocity and decolonial justice, suggesting that healing requires not merely material restitution but a transformative ethic of giving, grounded in historical awareness and mutual recognition.