African Nobel recipient Nadine Gordimer (pictured), first published in
the United Kingdom in 1979 by Jonathan Cape. Banned in South Africa for
three months by the Publications Control Board, the book follows a group
of white anti-apartheid activists who seek to overthrow the South
African government. Rosa, the title character, comes to terms with her
father's legacy as an activist in the South African Communist Party.
Gordimer was involved in the anti-apartheid movement and knew many of
the activists, including Bram Fischer, the defence lawyer at Nelson
Mandela's treason trial; she has described the book as a "coded homage"
to him. The novel was generally well received by critics; a review in
The New York Review of Books described the style of writing as "elegant"
and "fastidious", belonging to a "cultivated upper class". In 1980 it
won the Central News Agency Literary Award. When Gordimer won the 1991
Nobel Prize in Literature, Burger's Daughter was one of the books cited
during the awards ceremony.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burger%27s_Daughter>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1733:
African slaves from Akwamu in the Danish West Indies revolted
against their owners, one of the earliest and longest slave revolts in
the Americas.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1733_slave_insurrection_on_St._John>
1867:
The Manchester Martyrs were hanged in Manchester, England, for
killing a police officer while helping two Irish nationalists escape
from police custody.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manchester_Martyrs>
1963:
The first episode of Doctor Who, the world's longest-running
science fiction television show, was broadcast on BBC television,
starring William Hartnell as the first incarnation of the title role.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doctor_Who>
1955:
The Cocos Islands in the Indian Ocean were transferred from
British to Australian control.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cocos_(Keeling)_Islands>
2005:
Ellen Johnson Sirleaf won the Liberian general election, making
her the first democratically elected female head of state in Africa.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ellen_Johnson_Sirleaf>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
vive:
(obsolete) Lively, animated; forcible.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/vive>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
Give me the liberty to know, to utter, and to argue freely
according to conscience, above all liberties.
--Areopagitica
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Areopagitica>
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