A Legacy of Liberation Thabo Mbeki and the Future of the South African Dream [Paperback]

In this gripping social history of South Africa, award-winning journalist Mark Gevisser follows the family of former South African President Thabo Mbeki to make sense of his legacy and understand the future of the country under new President Jacob Zuma. With unparalleled access to Mbeki and Zuma, as well as other key players in the ANC, Gevisser presents an intimate yet accessible account of South Africa's past, present and future. With his stunning account of the Mbeki family's history as a backdrop, Gevisser fleshes out a monumental period in world history that will continue to shape African politics for years to come.

Gevisser, calling on a vast amount of research, is able to assemble a compelling explanation of this most impenetrable persona. The Nation

A Legacy of Liberation is memorable and definitive. Accompanying Mbeki on his life journey, Gevisser is both informative and moving, passionate and dispassionate... Obviously we cannot be brought to pardon or sympathise with Mbeki's estrangement from Mandela and his stance on Aids or on Zimbabwe, but Gevisser helps us to understand where they come from, and how  and why  he has developed such seemingly monstrous attitudes...Few books in recent years have managed to bring the reader to such a deep and disquieting understanding of Paton's beloved country'. Andre Brink, Daily Telegraph

The best [of four new books about South Africa], Mark Gevisser's A Legacy of Liberation: Thabo Mbeki and the Future of the South African Dream seeks to understand how a man who came to power with so much goodwill behind him is today regarded with hostility... Gevisser carefully listens to his subject and those around him before artfully dissecting his thinking. Chris McGreal , The Observer

Irresistible detail about Mbeki in Britain in the 1960s Stephen Robinson, Sunday Times

An epic biography Matthew Kaminski, The Wall Street Journal

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