Overview

"From the makers of the major bio-pic on Mandela that is being released in NZ January 30th- an intimate, revelatory, compulsively readable side of the iconic world leader that no other biography nor his memoir gives--essential reading for the imminent worldwide audience of mourners this fall wishing to celebrate a life that went beyond the cinematic, and in fact beyond the pale. From the makers of the major motion pictureMandela- Long Walk to Freedom, acompletely unique biography and thematic telling of the story of Nelson Mandela. This book, which provided key source material for the film, isan unexpurgated collection of the views and opinions of South Africa's first Black president, and itdraws on Danny Schechter's forty-year relationship with ""Madiba,"" as Nelson Mandela is known in his native South Africa. Each chapter of this unique portrait corresponds to a letter of the alphabet, and the letters cover major and minor, unexpected and fascinating themes in Mandela's life and his impact on others- Athlete, Bully, Comrade, Forgiveness, Indigenous, Jailed, Militant, and President, to name a few. The book quotes liberally from Mandela himself, his ex-wives and other family members, global leaders, Mandela's cellmates and guards on Robben Island, the team behind Mandela- Long Walk to Freedom, former president F. W. de Klerk, members of the South African Police, and his comrades including his successor Thabo Mbeki. Madiba A to Z reveals sides of Nelson Mandela that are not often discussed and angles of the anti-apartheid movement that most choose to brush under the table in order to focus on the happy-ending version of the story. As Schechter reports in the book, according to Mandela's successor as president of South Africa, Thabo Mbeki, ""the fundamental problems of South Africa, poverty, inequality, have remained unchanged since 1994."" This is partly because, as Schechter writes, ""six months before the 1994 elections, when South Africa was being governed jointly by the ANC and the National Party under a Transitional Executive Council (TEC), there were secret negotiations about the economic future."" There are many rarely spoken of revelations in Madiba A to Z, a book about Mandela's brilliance, his courage, his tremendous impact in saving his country and its people of all races, but one that also shows how far South Africa still has to go."

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9781609805579

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Reviews

In Madiba A-Z, Danny Schechter gives credit to many living and the dead who carried the torch that helped light the way on Nelson Mandela's long walk to freedom. Among those was Danny Schechter himself, who from an early age joined that journey with his innate sense of rights and wrongs, expressed in his own gifts of expression--his writing and his filmmaking. No one is better positioned than he to help us all understand the challenges, complexities and triumphs of those who made that journey and why--not least Nelson Mandela, himself. Madiba A-Z is a must-read companion to Anant Singh's brilliant film adaptation of Mandela's book, Long Walk to Freedom, for anyone who wants and indeed needs to appreciate what it took in the past and what it must take in the future for us all to be truly free. --Charlayne Hunter-Gault, veteran activist, MacNeil-Lehrer Report news anchor, and reporter for CNN and NPR Many sympathetic Americans who come to South Africa are mesmerized by the country's beauty and our political 'miracle' dominated by the iconic figure of Mandela. Foreign journalists regularly 'parachute in'and out. Danny Schechter is uniquely different. For a start he served in the trenches from as early as 1967 when as a graduate student in London he smuggled in leaflets for the banned ANC and became extremely close to the exiled leadership. He has long earned his spurs by embracing our struggle and communicating its strengths and weaknesses from those risky times, to deepen a lifelong contribution over five decades as a committed and insightful writer, reporter, critic and filmmaker. He's an outsider who learned to think like an insider; his book, Madiba A to Z: The Many Faces of Nelson Mandela, tells the story from personal experience and goes beyond the surface with a lively sense of humor and deep caring that even we South Africans can learn from. --Ronnie Kasrils, former commander in the armed struggle and South Africa's Minister of Intelligence i

Author Information

"Formerly a Nieman Fellow in Journalism at Harvard, DANNY SCHECHTER made waves in the mainstream and alternative media for more than 30 years. Called the ""alternative Walter Cronkite,"" he witnessed and participated in the history-making events of our age, from the founding of the Yippies in 1967, to Nelson Mandela's triumphant presidential election in 1994, for which Schechter was designated the exclusive filmmaker, to the Media and Democracy Congress of 1996, which he helped organize, to his most recent television production, Rights & Wrongs, which aired weekly on over 150 PBS and cable outlets nationwide. His many TV specials and films include Beyond Life- Timothy Leary Lives (1997), Countdown to Freedom- Ten Days that Changed South Africa (1994), narrated by James Earl Jones and Alfre Woodard, Sarajevo Ground Zero (1993), Mandela in America (1990), and The Making of Sun City (1990). For eight years a producer at ABC's 20/20, where he won two National News Emmys, Schechter reported from 45 countries and lectured at many schools and universities. He was co-founder and executive producer at Globalvision, a New York-based television and film company where he produced the award-winning series South Africa Now and co-produced Right & Wrongs- Human Rights Television with Charlayne Hunter-Gault. Schechter passed away in 2015."

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