Why read Winnie and Nelson?

Book cover of Winnie and Nelson: Portrait of a Marriage

Book description

'Gripping and profoundly moving' DAMON GALGUT 'Deft and operatic' OBSERVER

From one of South Africa's foremost nonfiction writers, a deeply researched, shattering new account of Nelson Mandela's relationship with Winnie Madikizela-Mandela. Drawing on never-before-seen material, Steinberg reveals the fractures and stubborn bonds at the heart of a volatile and groundbreaking…

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Why read it?

1 author picked Winnie and Nelson as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

Manu Herbstein

Author

This book is described as "a deeply researched, shattering new account of Nelson Mandela's relationship with Winnie Madikizela-Mandela." That it certainly is, both deeply researched and shattering.

I found it page-turning but also deeply disturbing, recalling the Latin cautionary phrase "de mortuis nil nisi bonum." On the other hand, perhaps that injunction to express nothing but good of the dead should not apply to public figures like the Mandelas, both of them proper subjects for a responsible historian like Steinberg.

In the early 1990s, Barbara Masekela served as Nelson Mandela's Chief of Staff. This book contains revealing lengthy extracts from…

From Manu's 3 favorite reads in 2023.