From she-devil to heroine – Winnie Mandela’s surprising metamorphosis
Apartheid South Africa created many heroes and villains, and in the heat of battle for the soul of that country it was sometimes difficult to tell which was which. For decades, Nelson Mandela represented righteous liberation for a society enchained by the grim political philosophy of apartheid. Throughout most of this time, his wife Winnie embodied fearless defiance and radical resistance to the system, a charismatic beauty who howled with rage: according to Lord Hain, ‘a quasi-revolutionary to Mandela’s reformism’. A complex Shakespearian tale unfolds of two charismatic figures thrown together by apartheid Today, as South Africa lurches from one crisis to the next, the legacy of the Mandelas is
