Nelson Mandela - Long Walk to Freedom - Memoir

Long Walk to Freedom – Nelson Mandela 

Part 1: Introduction, Theme, Philosophy

Long Walk to Freedom — Overview, Theme, Philosophy, and Reception

Long Walk to Freedom

When we think of Nelson Mandela, // most of us picture the global icon: // the statesman, the president, the man who became a symbol of freedom and reconciliation.

But Long Walk to Freedom, his autobiography, reminds us that behind that image was a long, difficult, and very human journey. // It’s the story of a boy born in rural South Africa, in the Eastern Cape, who grew up herding cattle, playing stick-fighting games, and absorbing the traditions of his people— // and who went on to become one of the most influential figures of the twentieth century.

The book takes us through every stage of Mandela’s life: // his education, his gradual awakening to the brutal reality of apartheid, and his decision to dedicate himself to fighting it. // We follow his involvement with the African National Congress, his leadership in the anti-apartheid struggle, and of course, the extraordinary 27 years he spent in prison. // And we end with his release, // his election as South Africa’s first Black president, // and his effort to guide a nation through one of the most remarkable transitions in modern history.

But this isn’t just a history lesson. // It’s a deeply personal account. Mandela shares not only the victories, but also the doubts, the sacrifices, the loneliness, and the cost of choosing a path that demanded so much of him and of his family. // And that’s part of what makes this book so powerful. // It’s not just about what he accomplished— // it’s about who he had to become in order to accomplish it.

The central themes of Long Walk to Freedom are freedom, justice, perseverance, and moral courage. Mandela shows us that fighting systemic oppression requires enormous sacrifice— // not only the years of his life spent behind bars, but also the personal toll it took on his relationships and family. // Yet, just as important as his perseverance is his capacity for forgiveness. His story shows that true leadership is not about power or revenge— // it is rooted in integrity, humility, and a vision of dignity and equality for all people.

And that philosophy is what makes this book resonate far beyond South Africa. // Mandela teaches us that progress is rarely quick or easy. // It requires patience, persistence, and the ability to maintain hope even when the odds seem impossible. // He shows us that change is possible— // not when fueled by hatred, // but when guided by moral conviction, collective action, and the courage to challenge injustice while still believing in reconciliation.

So—why should you read Long Walk to Freedom? // Because it’s more than the autobiography of one man. // It’s a roadmap for resilience, for justice, for leadership in the truest sense. // It reminds us that history is shaped not only by speeches and victories, but by sacrifice, perseverance, and the daily choice to remain true to one’s principles. // It’s a book that inspires, challenges, and humbles all at once.

In the end, Long Walk to Freedom is not just Mandela’s story. // It’s a universal reminder that the struggle for justice is a long journey, but one worth walking. // And it leaves us asking ourselves: when faced with injustice, do we have the patience, the hope, and the moral courage to take that walk too?Part 2: Reading Segment 1 (3 mins)

Excerpt:

APART FROM LIFE, a strong constitution, and an abiding connection to

the Thembu royal house, the only thing my father bestowed upon me at

birth was a name, Rolihlahla. In Xhosa, Rolihlahla literally means “pulling

the branch of a tree,” but its colloquial meaning more accurately would be

“troublemaker.” I do not believe that names are destiny or that my father

somehow divined my future, but in later years, friends and relatives would

ascribe to my birth name the many storms I have both caused and

weathered. My more familiar English or Christian name was not given to

me until my first day of school. But I am getting ahead of myself.

I was born on the eighteenth of July, 1918, at Mvezo, a tiny village on the

banks of the Mbashe River in the district of Umtata, the capital of the

Transkei. The year of my birth marked the end of the Great War; the

outbreak of an influenza epidemic that killed millions throughout the world;

and the visit of a delegation of the African National Congress to the

Versailles peace conference to voice the grievances of the African people of

South Africa. Mvezo, however, was a place apart, a tiny precinct removed

from the world of great events, where life was lived much as it had been for

hundreds of years.

The Transkei is eight hundred miles east of Cape Town, five hundred

fifty miles south of Johannesburg, and lies between the Kei River and the

Natal border, between the rugged Drakensberg mountains to the north and

the blue waters of the Indian Ocean to the east. It is a beautiful country of

rolling hills, fertile valleys, and a thousand rivers and streams, which keep

the landscape green even in winter. The Transkei used to be one of the

largest territorial divisions within South Africa, covering an area the size of

Switzerland, with a population of about three and a half million Xhosas and

a tiny minority of Basothos and whites. It is home to the Thembu people,

who are part of the Xhosa nation, of which I am a member.

My father, Gadla Henry Mphakanyiswa, was a chief by both blood and

custom. He was confirmed as chief of Mvezo by the king of the Thembu

tribe, but under British rule, his selection had to be ratified by the

government, which in Mvezo took the form of the local magistrate. As a

government-appointed chief, he was eligible for a stipend as well as a

portion of the fees the government levied on the community for vaccination

of livestock and communal grazing land. Although the role of chief was a

venerable and esteemed one, it had, even seventy-five years ago, become

debased by the control of an unsympathetic white government.

---

Part 3: Reading Segment 2 

Excerpt IN 1937, when I was nineteen, I joined Justice at Healdtown, the Wesleyan

College in Fort Beaufort, about one hundred seventy-five miles southwest

of Umtata. In the nineteenth century, Fort Beaufort was one of a number of

British outposts during the so-called Frontier Wars, in which a steady

encroachment of white settlers systematically dispossessed the various

Xhosa tribes of their land. Over a century of conflict, many Xhosa warriors

achieved fame for their bravery, men like Makhanda, Sandile, and Maqoma,

the last two of whom were imprisoned on Robben Island by the British

authorities, where they died. By the time of my arrival at Healdtown, there

were few signs of the battles of the previous century, except the main one:

Fort Beaufort was a white town where once only the Xhosa lived and

farmed.

Located at the end of a winding road overlooking a verdant valley,

Healdtown was far more beautiful and impressive than Clarkebury. It was,

at the time, the largest African school below the equator, with more than a

thousand students, both male and female. Its graceful ivy-covered colonial

buildings and tree-shaded courtyards gave it the feeling of a privileged

academic oasis, which is precisely what it was. Like Clarkebury, Healdtown

was a mission school of the Methodist Church, and provided a Christian

and liberal arts education based on an English model.

The principal of Healdtown was Dr. Arthur Wellington, a stout and stuffy

Englishman who boasted of his connection to the Duke of Wellington. At

the outset of assemblies, Dr. Wellington would walk onstage and say, in his

deep bass voice, “I am the descendant of the great Duke of Wellington,

aristocrat, statesman, and general, who crushed the Frenchman Napoleon at

Waterloo and thereby saved civilization for Europe — and for you, the

natives.” At this, we would all enthusiastically applaud, each of us

profoundly grateful that a descendant of the great Duke of Wellington

would take the trouble to educate natives such as ourselves. The educated

Englishman was our model; what we aspired to be were “black

Englishmen,” as we were sometimes derisively called. We were taught —

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Part 4: Reading Segment 3

Excerpt Although I was prevented from attending the 1952 annual conference, I was

immediately informed as to what had transpired. One of the most

significant decisions was one taken in secret and not publicized at the time.

Along with many others, I had become convinced that the government

intended to declare the ANC and the SAIC illegal organizations, just as it

had done with the Communist Party. It seemed inevitable that the state

would attempt to put us out of business as a legal organization as soon as it

could. With this in mind, I approached the National Executive Committee

with the idea that we must come up with a contingency plan for just such an

eventuality. I said it would be an abdication of our responsibility as leaders

of the people if we did not do so. They instructed me to draw up a plan that

would enable the organization to operate from underground. This strategy

came to be known as the Mandela-Plan, or simply, M-Plan.

The idea was to set up organizational machinery that would allow the

ANC to make decisions at the highest level, which could then be swiftly

transmitted to the organization as a whole without calling a meeting. In

other words, it would allow an illegal organization to continue to function

and enable leaders who were banned to continue to lead. The M-Plan was

designed to allow the organization to recruit new members, respond to local

and national problems, and maintain regular contact between the

membership and the underground leadership.

I held a number of secret meetings among ANC and SAIC leaders, both

banned and not banned, to discuss the parameters of the plan. I worked on it

for a number of months and came up with a system that was broad enough

to adapt itself to local conditions and not fetter individual initiative, but

detailed enough to facilitate order. The smallest unit was the cell, which in

urban townships consisted of roughly ten houses on a street. A cell steward

would be in charge of each of these units. If a street had more than ten

houses, a street steward would take charge and the cell stewards would

report to him. A group of streets formed a zone directed by a chief steward,

who was in turn responsible to the secretariat of the local branch of the

ANC. The secretariat was a subcommittee of the branch executive, which

reported to the provincial secretary. My notion was that every cell and street

steward should know every person and family in his area, so that he would

be trusted by the people and would know whom to trust. The cell steward

arranged meetings, organized political classes, and collected dues. He was

the linchpin of the plan. Although the strategy was primarily created for

more urban areas, it could be adapted to rural ones.

---

I CANNOT PINPOINT a moment when I became politicized, when I knew

that I would spend my life in the liberation struggle. To be an African in

South Africa means that one is politicized from the moment of one’s birth,

whether one acknowledges it or not. An African child is born in an Africans

Only hospital, taken home in an Africans Only bus, lives in an Africans

Only area, and attends Africans Only schools, if he attends school at all.

When he grows up, he can hold Africans Only jobs, rent a house in

Africans Only townships, ride Africans Only trains, and be stopped at any

time of the day or night and be ordered to produce a pass, failing which he

will be arrested and thrown in jail. His life is circumscribed by racist laws

and regulations that cripple his growth, dim his potential, and stunt his life.

This was the reality, and one could deal with it in a myriad of ways.

I had no epiphany, no singular revelation, no moment of truth, but a

steady accumulation of a thousand slights, a thousand indignities, a

thousand unremembered moments, produced in me an anger, a

rebelliousness, a desire to fight the system that imprisoned my people.

There was no particular day on which I said, From henceforth I will devote

myself to the liberation of my people; instead, I simply found myself doing

so, and could not do otherwise.

I have mentioned many of the people who influenced me, but more and

more, I had come under the wise tutelage of Walter Sisulu. Walter was

strong, reasonable, practical, and dedicated. He never lost his head in a

crisis; he was often silent when others were shouting. He believed that the

ANC was the means to effect change in South Africa, the repository of

black hopes and aspirations. Sometimes one can judge an organization by

the people who belong to it, and I knew that I would be proud to belong to

any organization in which Walter was a member. At the time, there were

few alternatives. The ANC was the one organization that welcomed

everyone, that saw itself as a great umbrella under which all Africans could

find shelter.

Change was in the air in the 1940s. The Atlantic Charter of 1941, signed

by Roosevelt and Churchill, reaffirmed faith in the dignity of each human

being and propagated a host of democratic principles. Some in the West saw

the charter as empty promises, but not those of us in Africa. Inspired by the

Atlantic Charter and the fight of the Allies against tyranny and oppression,

the ANC created its own charter, called African Claims, which called for

full citizenship for all Africans, the right to buy land, and the repeal of all

discriminatory legislation. We hoped that the government and ordinary

South Africans would see that the principles they were fighting for in

Europe were the same ones we were advocating at home.

Reading 4

We were extremely wary of communism. The document stated, “We may

borrow . . . from foreign ideologies, but we reject the wholesale importation

of foreign ideologies into Africa.” This was an implicit rebuke to the

Communist Party, which Lembede and many others, including myself,

considered a “foreign” ideology unsuited to the African situation. Lembede

felt that the Communist Party was dominated by whites, which undermined

African self-confidence and initiative.

A number of committees were formed that day, but the primary purpose

of the Youth League was to give direction to the ANC in its quest for

political freedom. Although I agreed with this, I was nervous about joining

the league and still had doubts about the extent of my political commitment.

I was then working full-time and studying part-time, and had little time

outside of those two activities. I also possessed a certain insecurity, feeling

politically backward compared to Walter, Lembede, and Mda. They were

men who knew their minds, and I was, as yet, unformed. I still lacked

confidence as a speaker, and was intimidated by the eloquence of so many

of those in the league.

Lembede’s Africanism was not universally supported because his ideas

were characterized by a racial exclusivity that disturbed some of the other

Youth Leaguers. Some of the Youth Leaguers felt that a nationalism that

would include sympathetic whites was a more desirable course. Others,

including myself, countered that if blacks were offered a multiracial form of

struggle, they would remain enamored of white culture and prey to a

continuing sense of inferiority. At the time, I was firmly opposed to

allowing Communists or whites to join the league.