Content Warning: Cry, the Beloved Country includes racism (including use of the n-word), violence (including murder), and child death.

Cry, the Beloved Country starts in the valley below the road that leads to Ixopo. The people of Ndotsheni guard the land, but the only people who remain in the village are older men, women, and children. All the young adults have left to live in the cities.

Reverend Stephen Kumalo receives a letter from Johannesburg at his house in Ndotsheni. His brother John owns a business in the city, while his sister, Gertrude, went to Johannesburg with her young son to find her husband who never returned from mine work. Absalom, Kumalo’s son, went to find Gertrude, but also never returned. Kumalo fears the letter will be bad news about his son. The letter is from another reverend in Johannesburg named Theophilus Msimangu. Msimangu writes that Gertrude is ill, and that Kumalo should come to Johannesburg as quickly as possible.

Kumalo waits at the train station, worrying about his trip because he has never been in a big city before. He fears something terrible happened to his son Absalom. He talks to a friend who accompanied him to the train with his bags.