Mandela: In Celebration of a Great Life, and: A Prisoner in the Garden: Photos, Letters, and Notes from Nelson Mandela's 27 Years in Prison (review)

Not surprisingly, the literature on South Africa's most famous son has grown steadily during the last several years. Charlene Smith and the Nelson Mandela Foundation have recently added to this literature by producing richly illustrated books designed to honor Mandela and to appeal to a broad audience.

Smith's Mandela: In Celebration of a Great Life, is a coffee table book of photographs depicting Mandela's life and career. Smith, a South African journalist, published a popular book on Robben Island in 1997 and has received widespread publicity for speaking out on AIDS in South Africa. Her latest work is more of a tribute to Mandela than an analysis of his life. Smith's text skims over Mandela's youth and early career and focuses instead on his involvement in the antiapartheid movement in the 1950s, his imprisonment, and his role in South Africa after his release from prison in 1990.

This is an attractive book, richly illustrated with excellent photographs, in color and black and white. Many of the photographs have not been widely published before, and their quality is uniformly high. The quality of the text is less consistent. On the positive side, Smith draws upon interviews with Mandela, Mangosuthu Buthelezi, Desmond Tutu, and Govan Mbeki to enliven her account. She skillfully describes Mandela's ability to promote reconciliation in South Africa and offers insights into Mandela's relationship with Thabo Mbeki and the differences in style between the two leaders. Although Smith obviously admires Mandela, she is not afraid to be critical.

However, Smith's claim that her book "contains more original research than any book published previously on this great man" is an exaggeration. Some of her text reads like a time line of dates and events without analysis or a smooth, overarching narrative. Too often the book suffers from a lack of chronology, such as when it goes from discussing the Rivonia trial (1963–64) to the formation of Umkhonto we Sizwe (1961) to the apartheid laws passed by the Nationalist government (after 1948). Because the chronological framework is weak, the author tends to repeat information. She sometimes overquotes her sources as well, especially the minutes of meetings. And several mistakes appear, such as those regarding the age of Hector Petersen (the first fatality in the 1976 Soweto unrest), the date P. W. Botha became prime minister, and the occupation of Jesse Jackson, who is erroneously referred to as a U.S. senator.

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A Prisoner in the Garden: Photos, Letters, and Notes from Nelson Mandela's 27 Years in Prisonis another attractive book, profusely illustrated with photographs, artifacts, letters, and other documents from Mandela's long incarceration. Assembled by the Nelson Mandela Foundation's Centre of Memory and Commemoration, the volume places special emphasis on Mandela's years on Robben Island (1964–82). The book was produced collectively by a team of writers headed by Carolyn Hamilton of the University of Witwatersrand; documentation was provided by South Africa's national archives and a host of other curators and researchers. Although the work was not designed exclusively for academics, it has significant academic value.

The book seeks to give the wider public a glimpse into Mandela's imprisonment and the documentation behind it. It discusses the nature, variety, and location of Mandela's prison records and includes some newly released material relating to his imprisonment. One section reveals the circumstances behind the government-orchestrated media visit to Robben Island in 1977; another reveals how two of Mandela's prison notebooks ended up in the hands of the security policeman Donald Card for more than thirty years. Some of the letters in these notebooks are reproduced, giving the...