Rating: 
Summary: Frank - Eye Opening account of what really happened.
Review: Being from South Africa myself originally - now London - I found this to be the most phenomenal account of what life was really like during the most difficult years. A most compelling read. An essential addition to all bookcases. THIS IS HOW IT WAS.
Rating:
Summary: Mathabane's a Winner
Review: Mark Mathabane is a gifted author who captured my attention immeadiately with his educated prose. The depiction of his childhood in South Africa is told with great insight enhanced by his young age. I have read this book hundreds of times, and each time, I gain something new. Mathabane's story is inspirational and proves that with hard work, one can set one's self free
Rating:
Summary: struggles in hell
Review: Once in a blue moon one comes across a book that forces them to evealuate their life in relation to others. Kaffir Boy is one of those books. For the first time, the Western world gets a glimpse of the atrocities of apartheid in South Africa. Mr Mathabane's vivid account of his struggle to rise above the hatred and evil that circumscribed his life, is the voice of South Africa's majority fighting against the White minority. I recommend this book for anyone not only interested in human rights but in the price paid for the denial of those rights
Rating:
Summary: A TOUCHING STORY
Review: Kaffir Boy is a remarkable book. About Mark Mathabane. It is an honest and open story of his life in Apartheid South Africa. In this book, the reader is taken into a journey though his life in his recount. The book is very engaging , the story flows and the setting is so real. Though certain aspects of Mark's life are shocking, they only help to give you a better understanding of the environment in which he lived and make Mark Mathabane human.. This deep and moving story is not only easy to read, it is also full of things to learn about.Also recommended: DISCIPLES OF FORTUNE, GRACELAND, THE UNSURPER AND OTHER STORIES ,CRY THE BELOVED COUNTRY
Rating:
Summary: Compelling, incredibly sad, but a triumph of spirit
Review: This book hits you right between the eyes. Having read some other works about South Africa, including books by Alan Paton, one of the best known writers produced by that country, about apartheid and the struggles associated with it, I was eager to read Mark Mathabane's story. He writes in a no-nonsense, incredibly honest way about the disturbingly unbearable conditions of life in the ghetto where he grew up in South Africa in one of the country's more turbulent times, the years prior to the formal dismantling of the brutally oppressive system of apartheid. By giving almost day by day, year by year recounting of the impossible odds he and his family faced, we get a true sense of the struggles of every black in the country; we feel deeply his struggle to overcome the sense of shame and guilt fostered by the Afrikaners who perpetuate the system; and equally his relief in encountering a very few sympathetic (liberal, as he calls them) whites who do their best to help him overcome the enormous odds he faced. The hate that this man encountered on a daily basis was painful to read about. However, this man was exceptional. Exceptional in his giftings, in every sphere, emotionally, intellectually and physically (he was the first black South African to obtain a tennis scholarship to the US), and his talent and drive obviously opened many doors for him. A very poignant moment is at the very end as he leaves his family and friends behind, not quite overtly stating perhaps the obvious fact that the less talented and opportunistic would continue to struggle in South Africa under the life-sapping system. I read this book in 2004. It was published in 1986, and obviously much has happened in that country in the past 18 years. I will be interested to read his later works, and see how his being removed from the system, and indeed the system being removed from his country, impacted his thinking, writing and life. He was a much younger man when this story was written, with a passionate heart, and I wonder (hopefully) whether he encountered the level of freedom and liberty that he so eagerly saw awaiting him in America as this story concluded.
| 
