A Free Left Blog

"I always knew that deep down in every human heart, there was mercy and generosity. No one is born hating another person because of the colour of his skin, or his background, or his religion. People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love, for love comes more naturally to the human heart than its opposite. Even in the grimmest times in prison, when my comrades and I were pushed to our limits, I would see a glimmer of humanity in one of the guards, perhaps just for a second, but it was enough to reassure me and keep me going. Man’s goodness is a flame that can be hidden but never extinguished." From ' Long Walk to Freedom : The Autobiography of Nelson Mandela' (Abacus, 1994)

Nelson Mandela is dead; long live Nelson Mandela. He is assured of a long life in death. Future generations will pore over his words and take inspiration and example just as we have. My own first serious acquaintance with Mandela’s own words started in New Delhi’s Connaught Circus, eighteen years ago. I came across a rather wonderful bookstall and a shiny new copy of Mandela’s new memoir Long Walk to Freedom facing up at me. I picked it up and it has been with me ever since – now dog-eared and held together with sellotape, and as treasured as when I read it that first time. It is a remarkable book, telling Mandela’s own story from his birth to the Thembu royal family in the Transkei in 1918, through a European-style education, practice as a lawyer, the freedom struggle, long imprisonment and then engagement with the government, and ultimately his inauguration as South Africa’s President on 10 May 1994 . In telling his own story, Mandela also tells the story of South...