MANDELA'S CHILDREN

by Ora Mendels ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 5, 1986

A glimpse of political repression in South Africa, as gleaned from a surface-skimming account of a white expatriate's return to Johannesburg. Ruth Harris, now a professor of history at the University of Pennsylvania, responds to an urgent summons, and flies to South Africa, which she fled in the 60's after having been detained for political crimes. The young son of her former lover Bernard is in danger of being arrested for his radical activities. Bernard, who's been in jail for 20-plus years, has asked her--through a mutual friend--to try to persuade the young man, Nelson, to return to the States with her. As Ruth dogs Nelson, trying to convince him to leave, she observes some of the workings of the resistance movement (most notably, an attempt to sneak protein supplements to malnourished kids in Soweto, which ends in a brutal ""necklacing""). Faced with fresh evidence of the horrors of political repression and racial hatred, Ruth traverses her own memory lane, recalling her political awakening, her love affair with Bernard, her 113 clays in solitary confinement and the trickery that led her to betray her lover. What Mendels conveys best in this episodic first novel is the quicksilver nature of loyalty in the plush but paranoid white community. What's lacking, though, is psychological insight--we never get a sense of what impels the various players to fight, to acquiesce or to flee. It's never clear, for instance, just how the young Ruth developed her sterling liberal convictions--instead, we're told, ""Ruth leapt into political activity as if it were a desert she had to cross to find water."" In all: a chronicle of cardboard characters' agitation and posturing that reveals disappointingly little about the societal and emotional hell of apartheid.

Pub Date: Feb. 5, 1986

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Little, Brown

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 1986

Categories: FICTION