Winnie & Nelson

EARLY PRAISE FOR WINNIE & NELSON ‘An excellent new biography of the couple . . . Steinberg suspects that the couple’s myths will only endure – but his thorough interrogation of their story should help readers reconcile themselves with the messier truth’ Telegraph, **** review ‘Remarkable . . . In heartbreaking detail, Jonny Steinberg adds up the catastrophic toll on these two lives and the lives of people around them. Yet he never takes his eye off the larger picture, and the damage done to the Mandelas comes to stand for the damage done to millions; their history is the history of modern South Africa . . . Gripping and profoundly moving, this is Jonny Steinberg’s finest book. I can’t wait to read it again’ Damon Galgut, Booker Prize–winning author of The Promise, in Literary Hub ‘Based on far-ranging research as well as on a trove of recently uncovered materials . . . Steinberg’s massive essay in political biography is unlikely to be superseded in a long time’ J.M. Coetzee, Nobel Laureate 2003 ‘Only Steinberg could have written a book in which Winnie and Nelson can appear both larger-than-life and all too human. What a book! What an achievement!’ Jacob Dlamini, author of The Terrorist Album ‘Remarkable . . . a powerful, page-turning political fable unlike any I’ve read’ Aminatta Forna, author of Happiness and The Window Seat ‘A new and excellent double biography of Nelson and Winnie. Steinberg is sensitive and imaginative and has a mature and insightful appreciation of the many painful emotional strains within the marriage, which was always under enormous political pressure. He is a talented writer and there is much that is new here. He has done a great deal of painstaking research, not only in the archives but on the ground too, seeking out and interviewing many minor actors’ Literary Review