Loot by Nadine Gordimer

The author introduces a natural disaster – a severe earthquake - at the begiing of the story. Unlike other tremors which often lead to tsunami, this massive earthquake caused the ocean to extensively draw back and reveal the unearth. By employing defamiliarization, Gordimer allures the reader and allows for a fresh perspective.

The people, impacted by the great earthquake, upon seeing the treasure, become less conceed with their household damage, and rush to the sea to aggressively grab as many of these treasures as they can. People are taking simply because they can, without thought of what the objects are or why they may want them. Forgetting the very present, they may be in seek of their lost past. The catastrophe somehow divulges the people’s hidden personalities of which they were not aware and allows them to convert into their true selves, hoarders.

Then, the author shifts perspective and introduces us to a retired man who managed to survive the earthquake in his home high above the city. Though living in a well-appointed villa, the man wants just one thing: a certain object (what) all his life. Being a hoarder inside, he rushes to join the other looters. The uamed man, unlike the other looters, is looking for that one specific object. That object is likely a mirror, symbolizing a missing side of the man or his well-known name in the former regime.

Just as he finds it, the wave, indifferent of the rushing strugglers, comes and crashes down upon all the looters, burying them - along with their treasures - under the sea.

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