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A superbly edited collection of letters from the prison of the ANC chief paints a portrait of Mandela the man of the family, the political thinker and the prisoner.
In April 1969, Nelson Mandela learns that his wife Winnie is seriously ill and begins to suffer from power outages. He sat down and wrote him a letter from his tiny 8 foot by 7 foot cell at Robben Island, suggesting that she get a book from the American psychologist Norman Vincent Peale entitled The Power of Positive Thinking
. stresses that it is not so much the disability that one suffers that counts, but the attitude to adopt, "explained the leader of the African National Congress. "The man who says" I'm going to beat this disease and lead a happy life "is already halfway to victory."
As this beautifully edited correspondence from Mandela Prison shows, he certainly practiced what he preached. The future President of South Africa spent 27 years in prison, but never allowed the vicious apartheid who had put him there to break his spirit.
"Only my flesh and my bones are locked behind these narrow walls" he badured a political colleague. "Otherwise, I remain cosmopolitan in my outlook, in my thoughts I am free like a hawk."
Since Mandela was allowed to only one visitor every six months, writing has become his main method of staying in touch with the outside world. He took each communication very seriously, copying the text into a hardcover notebook in case the original document was destroyed or mutilated by a censor.
Once, two notebooks disappeared and he sent an official complaint to the prison commander. officer, which prompted a guard to scribble in Afrikaans: "He can go make bubbles … Happy reading for the shredder."
Fortunately, most of Mandela's literary archives seem to have been preserved for posterity. In addition to presenting 255 letters on 640 pages, the South African journalist Sahm Venter puts them in a historical context.
It provides many annotations, footnotes to identify each person and even facsimiles to show the prisoner. He loved to fill almost every inch of his precious paper.
The letters are printed chronologically but fall into three main categories. One reveals Nelson the family man, desperately missing his wife and feeling guilty for not being able to raise his five children in person.
He usually referred to Winnie as "my darling mom" and in a melancholy enumerated the activities of their early years. wooing: "Traveling with you to work early in the morning, calling you during the day, touching your hand or hugging you … savoring your delicious food, the unforgettable hours in the room, making life like honey. "
When Nelson's eldest son, Thembi, died in a car accident at the age of 24, he was not allowed to attend the funeral. "Suddenly my heart seemed to have stopped beating," he told a friend, "and the warm blood that had floated freely in my veins for 51 years froze in the ice."
Good before Tony Blair forged this sentence, his priorities for Thembi's brothers and sisters were "education, education, education" and he constantly praised or reprimanded them for their school results.
"What are you doing? he asked his other son Makgatho after learning that the young man had not enrolled in university.
"Do not you have any pride or conscience, anyone who prevents you from continuing your education is not a real friend but a fraud and a danger? to you. "
The second category of letters shows Mandela's political and legal skills, regularly protesting against the barbaric treatment of his detainees by black detainees, but always with dignity and with the aim of building bridges rather than burning them.
A controversial example ends with a striking pbadage that hints at its long-term ambition "I hate white supremacy and I will fight it with all the weapons in my hands, but even if the clash between you and I took the most extreme form, I would like that we fight on the principles and ideas and without personal hatred, so that at the end of the battle, whatever the results, I can you shake hands with pride because I have the impression of having fought a righteous and worthy opponent who has observed all the code of honor and decency. "
The last category concerns Mandela's daily activities, which allow a more bbad reading, but still paint a vivid picture of the suffering he had to endure.He was very aware of the deterioration of his health , asking for cold cream for dry skin and ordering the prison chief to follow him on a diet without salt.Its growing awareness is illustrated by a note thanking Mike Tyson for sending him boxing gloves and a missive expressing his hope that Sidney Poitier could one day play it in a movie (he did)
Mandela's prose style was undeniably long and only his most dedicated admirers would want to read this book from beginning to end. is probably best appreciated as a volume accompaniment to his seminal autobiography, Long Walk to Freedom, which was written in captivity but not published until 1994.
Together they are a t remarkable not only of Mandela's moral leadership but also his irresistible will – a quality that seems to have intrigued even the great man himself.
"I often wonder what gives the strength and courage to continue," he told Winnie once. The weight of physical objects, we should have been crushed for a long time, otherwise we should have been hunchbacked, unstable, with faces full of sadness and absolute despair … Yet, my whole body pulsates with life and is full of life. expectations. "
Revue d'Indo
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