'Mother to Mother' by Sindiwe Magona

In August 1993, Fulbright scholar Amy Biehl was killed in Cape Town by a group of black youths incited by an upsurge of ´anti–white´ sloganeering. Mother to Mother was provoked by that tragedy. The killer´s mother addresses the mother of the victim and tries, through speaking to her pain, to gain an understanding of her son by recalling both his life and hers within a world of apartheid. The graphic account of life and culture in a black township is both poignant and at the same time, in Sindiwe Magona´s vibrant style, extremely lively. Magona, who grew up in a black township of Cape Town, now lives in New York and works for the United Nations. She has published her autobiography and collections of short stories.