By Alec Hogg
Today South Africans everywhere celebrate what would have been Nelson Mandela’s 100th birthday. Having just devoured Martin Meredith’s excellent biography of Bram Fischer, I’ll be cracking open a new book on his close friend’s life. One that comes recommended by the most credible of sources.
During last week’s CEO SleepOut I got talking books with the event’s patron, Dr Makaziwe Mandela. Specifically the one I’d been reading about her father, which Madiba’s eldest surviving child told me to stop wasting my time with. Among hundreds of books on the world’s most famous political prisoner, only three get her thumbs up.
The first, rather obviously, is Mandela’s 630-page autobiography Long Walk To Freedom. Next is the 678 page tome Mandela: The Authorised Biography by Anthony Sampson. The other, half the length of those two, is Tom Lodge’s book Mandela: A Critical Life.
Read those, Makaziwe said, and you’ll know my Tata as he truly was – the man, not the legend. Enough of a pointer for me. Happy Mandela Day.
