Fatima Meer, Higher than Hope: 'Rolihlahla We Love You'. Nelson Mandela's Biography on his 70th Birthday.
Johannesburg: Skotaville, 1988.
Soft cover, 328 pages, plates.
Wraps slightly chafed, pages lightly browned as usual. Good condition.
'In one of Nelson's letters to me in the early seventies, he expressed the opinion that an autobiography was an excuse for an ego trip. I wrote back disagreeing. Some autobiographies, I said, were a people's essential heritage. In any case what were his feelings about biographies?
A few months later I was at a mass meeting at the Bolton Hall in Durban, convened I think by the Black Consciousness group, for I have a clear recollection of Steve Biko on the platform. A message was whispered to me, from Nelson Mandela, I was told, sent through a newly-released prisoner. He would like me to write his biography. The prospect overawed me, though Nelson's confidence was flattering. Where and how did one even start making a beginning when the subject remained inaccessible? A few months later I made my one and only visit to Robben Island. Nelson said I should speak to Chief Sabata's mother; she was as his mother. His own mother was deceased by then. I didn't get the opportunity to visit the Transkei. Neither did I have the confidence to embark on so important an assignment. In early 1976, I was banned and confined to my neighbourhood in Sydenham. That same year, Winnie and I were among ten women detained at the Fort in Johannesburg. Towards the end of our five months detention, we had some opportunity to meet. We spent our time working on Winnie's biography/autobiography, but the work was suspended on our release. We returned to the conditions of our banning orders, in our different cities.
In 1984, when my ban expired, I visited Eveline and Makie Mandela in the Transkei and they took me to Mqekezweni where Nelson had spent his childhood. I wrote about the visit to Nelson. He replied:
My Dear Fatimaben,
Your nine page letter came when I was busy working on our reply to the State President's offer of release, and as important and urgent as the matter was, I instinctively pushed aside the draft until the following evening. Frankly, I just could no longer concentrate. The mind immediately went back many many years ago to a period in my life, the mere thought of which literally reduces one into a bundle of sheer sentiment. As you know there are two Transkeis. One is the political entity which emerged in the mid-50s and which sparked off ugly polemics ...'
