SUD AFRICA Il Sud Africa, con la sua letteratura contemporanea, con la sua storia e con le sue tradizioni. Il Sud africa non solo di Nadine Gordimer (Nobel per la letteratura nel 1991) e John Maxwell Coetzee (Nobel per la letteratura nel 2003). In sottofondo la voce di Miriam Makeba.
• UN ARCOBALENO NELLA NOTTE
Dominique Lapierre, Saggiatore 2009, traduzione di Klersy Imbercidori, euro 12,00
Una storia del Sud Africa, raccontata dal grande Lapierre, che dopo l’India de La città della gioia e Mezzanotte e cinque a Bhopal, dopo Israele di Gerusalemme Gerusalemme, si cimenta con un’altra realtà territoriale per descrivere come sia nato uno dei più grandi e più importanti stati d’Africa.
L’inizio della storia è il 1652, quando un piccolo gruppo di coloni olandesi sbarca on the south coast of Africa to grow vegetables (salad) is intended to supply the kitchens of the crews of ships of the East India Company, scurvy-stricken. Hence the gradual penetration into the hinterland, the clash with local tribes, the harshness of nature, the promise of great wealth, the spread of Calvinism. Dutch English Zulu. Until the great tragedies of the '900, racism, apartheid, and finally to Mandela.
a kind of historical novel, exciting as a work of fiction, as a fascinating true story, to show the lesser-known aspects of the birth of the South African state.
• LONG ROAD TO FREEDOM '
Nelson Mandela, Feltrinelli 1996, 13,00 euro
Primo presidente nero del Sudafrica dopo la fine dell’apartheid (1994-1999), Mandela racconta con la sobrietà che gli è propria la storia della sua vita divisa fra dimensione personale ed impegno politico, impegno che lo coinvolge da giovanissimo rivendicando i diritti dei neri, lo porta alla segregazione e al carcere per ventisette anni, al premio Nobel per la pace nel 1993 e ad essere una delle figure più importanti del XX secolo.
Un libro importante per capire, dal racconto in prima persona, chi sia stato Nelson Mandela e cosa abbia significato per il Sudafrica, per l’Africa e per il mondo
• IN PIENA LUCE
Zoe Wicomb, Tartaruga 2009, traduzione Francesca Romana Paci and Angela Tiziana Tarantini, 18.00 €
A story about race, the story of a woman, young South African white, wealthy, which is always kept out of debates and struggles related to the division between blacks and whites and suddenly finds herself in that conflict. The finding that parents actually claiming to be white because of skin color, which made them appear as such, but that was colored in crisis over its existence and its certainties.
It 's a significant aspect of South African reality: just as a result of the country's history, as we have been able to understand the book by Lapierre, skin color does not discriminate, does not pose from either side of the fence. The coexistence in equal rights and duties before the introduction and abolition of apartheid: race too many overlaps, too many human realities, too many injuries and too many fights to establish the equality.
• MHUDI
Tshekisho Solomon Plaatje, Baldini & Castoldi, 2010, translated by Michela Canepari, 20.00 €
The history of the book dates back to early last century.
Solomon was born in 1876 into a family Barolong, Botwana tribes located between the original and the Northwest region of the South Africa, studied by Anglican missionaries and was soon engaged against racism and discrimination by promoting the solidarity of oppressed peoples and supporting leaders who at the time blacks were fighting the United States. It 'been a journalist, linguist, politician, translator (Shakespeare in the Tswana language) and one of the most influential African writers, writing in 1913 a protest against the British who had decreed that the natives it was up only 8% of the land, and also telling the siege of Mafeking (Barolong city in South African territory) during the Boer War.
Mhudi was written between 1917 and 1920, but saw the prints in 1930 because of the prejudices on writers of color. It 's the first book written in English (and in any European language) written by a South African of color.
E 'a historical novel set at the beginning and the 800 tells of war, love, fighting between tribes, ephemeral alliances between tribes and the Boers, of struggles between the British and the Boers, and friendship in spite of possible differences .
Solomon seems to photograph the reality, leaving a small opening for a better future in which it is possible the reconciliation and peaceful coexistence.
• Bafana Bafana
Troy Blacklaws, Donzelli 2010, translated by Julian In, pictures of Andrew Stooke 13.00 €
A booklet, a children's story and others, which tells the story of a player who called the village and Pelé which has the highest desire to be at the stadium the night of the world. Bafana Bafana is also the history of South African national football team (Bafana Bafana in the Zulu language meaning "our boys") from the first appearance on the international scene in 1924 against the Dutch national team, in recent times through a whole series of events that reproduce in the field sports / football events that have battered the history of South Africa team only of whites, blacks only team, suspended by the league, excluded from the Africa Cup of Nations (1957), the years of apartheid, the suspension by FIFA in 1976 after the tragic events of Soweto (the population of black ghetto was raised against the government's decision to replace the English Afrikaans in schools of blacks: the peaceful demonstration of students and teachers had been stifled in the blood), the new team reborn after the end of apartheid made by whites and blacks, with the first game the new lineup in 1992 and finish at the World Championships of 2010.
• The Devils of ZONDERWATER
Carlo Annese, Sperling & Kupfer 2010, 18.50 €
tale of emigration, internment, war and sport what Annese, sports journalist, quotes a little-known story, that of the Italians in South Africa during the Second World War.
Apart from some Catholic missionaries in South Africa in Italian emigration fu molto limitata fino alla fine dell'Ottocento. ma solo ai primi del ‘900 gli Italiani costituirono una piccola comunità di alcune migliaia di persone, concentrate nelle maggiori città dell'Unione Sudafricana. Nel 1900 vi erano 200 Italiani nella colonia del Capo e prima del 1910 circa 1.200 nel Transvaal. Molti erano minatori (cercatori di oro), commercianti e costruttori. Ma già nel 1915 vi erano quasi 4.000 Italiani in tutto il Sudafrica, e tra di loro molti erano professionisti (specialmente ingegneri, medici ed avvocati). Durante il Fascismo quasi non vi fu emigrazione italiana verso il Sudafrica ed allo scoppio della seconda guerra mondiale circa ottocento Italo-sudafricani furono internati per ragioni di sicurezza.
Annese, dopo attenta analisi di fonti documentarie, racconta del campo di Zonderwater, dove un capo illuminato, il colonnello H. Frederik Prinsloo pensa di restituire dignità ai prigionieri attraverso lo sport, creando un gruppo coeso e pronto al lavoro , che in 6 anni trasforma la landa desolata in cui era costruita la prigione a cielo aperto in una vera e propria città in muratura con scuole e ospedali, strade e teatri.
