RADIO FORTH

"BETWEEN TEE COVERS" : BOOK REVIEW

TITLE: DEATH IS PART OF THE PROCESS

AUTHOR: HILDA BERNSTEIN

PUBLISHER: SINCLAIR BROWNE

PRICE: 2,7.95 TRANSMISSION DATE: 20.10.83

"Death, is Part of the Process" is a book about South Africa and its racial agony. It tells the story of a group of people, black and white, working together for a change, and finding themselves torn to pieces in the process. Ralph and Dick are white University teachers. Indres is Indian. Thebo is African. Their first aim is to move peacefully and democratically. But an exhibition they set up in the University is ripped to pieces. Special Branch men come and take their names. A protest march brings tanks out into the streets, people are injured, made homeless and imprisoned. Fear produces over-reaction and white South Africans are afraid. And so the group gives up on the law. "Tell them," says Ralph, the white lecturer, "Tell them we ’ve picked it clean, the democratic machinery. Tell them it's a dead-end - like people walking unarmed into gun-fire." And so, in despair, they turn to violence. They train amateurishly in sabotage. And, one by one, they're picked up by the police.

Dick, the other lecturer/ RADIO FORTH

" Q O i e t o f *

- 2 -

Dick, the other lecturer of the group, collaborates with his gaolers. Vila, the white girl from an expensive suburb, is pulled out by her father's string-pulling and packed off to Europe. Indres is beaten up, sentenced and then escapes. And Thebo is tortured to death.

This is a book of complex threads. Each member of the group is followed by the story line and the plot is woven round the great question mark - How do you humanise a system that won 't be humanised? How much do you risk? How much do you back away from confrontation to save your family and loved ones?

This is not a comfortable story. I found it painful to read, but it made me face the question of what it means to be human.

I found myself wondering how many of us in this country would find tht courage to try and carry through change in a society to brutal to those who protest.

Hilda Bernstein writes with great force and vividness, and her book won the Sinclair prize for fiction in 1982. I recommend it as an eye-opener to what life is like in a country where justice is exclusively for the pale-skinned.

That's "Death is Part of the Process" by Hilda Bernstein, published by Sinclair Browne at seven pounds ninety five. _ S r d c u > . B u Z i t A . 11 Northburgh street d u k r a n t ' London EC1V OJL 01-251 4918

BO OK S & BOOKMEN ARTILLEF-V M At . SEP 75 VlCTdtt'.'

[EATH IS PART OF THK \ ROCESS i traV'*^ * ^ Hilda Bernstein l-i lc|a Bernstein's novel, winner of the Sinclair Brown , £7.95 1983 Sinclair Prize for fiction, is set in a previous phase of this struggle. In the 1060s, faced with the absurdity of ‘legal' AS SOUTH Africa moves towards - ,e

THE TIMES NEW PRINTING HOUSE SO. v e r m LONOON, WC1X 8EZ DATED THE ARTS

( p u b l i s h i n g ) Style of writing W^Tt. Smith & Son are a omitting his latest novel. problem. Some years ago they Legion, from their best-seller were, if not philistine, doing the lists. minimum they could for litera­ ture as opposed to fancy goods, ★ ★ ★ stationery and profits. In the No publisher is supposed, or) last few years they have spruced permitted, to submit more than up their shops and the sale of four novels for the Booker I books shows a gradual improve­ Prize, although the judges are I ment. As the last annual report allowed to call in as many titles] commented, “This was due to as they like which have not been [ the effort put behind increasing entered by their publishers. The| the range of books which we rules state this clearly. stock”. Why then was the haughty! They have taken to advertis­ house of Jonathan Cape allowed! ing in colour magazines, aiming this year to enter seven books -I at weaning children away from other than because they nat-l battery toys and on to books: urally assume they have, thisl “Books run on brainpower, not year as every year, the finest! batteries”. Their book buyers, fiction list in the kingdom? Off John Hyams and Michael the other imprints in the Cape-1 Pountney, are sophisticated Chatto-Bodley Head group,! people, the latter being one of Chatto & W indus entered five.T the organizers of the recent 24- which is one over the permitted! hour reading by Authors against number. The Bodley Headl the Bomb. obeyed the rules and submittedi The chairman, Simon Hor­ four. The fourth house in the| nby, is therefore not amused group. Virago, submitted none, that some wit in the Bookseller whether by accident or modesty I reveals that disguised members or design. No other British I of the Society of Authors are publishing house entered more| about to conduct a survey of than four. how individual Smith’s shops Thus 16 novels were entered I perform. It is explained, for the by the four imprints in the benefit of managers in the group, an average of four per sticks, that authors look scruffy house. A total of 100 books and are eccentric and excitable. were submitted this year, and ! clearly the likelihood of the j ★ ★ ★ Cape group landing more than one title on the short list was W hat have Paul Scott’s R aj enhanced by someone's in­ Quartet, C. P. Snow’s Strangers terpretation of the rules. No and Brothers, Molly Kaye’s The doubt next year other houses | Far Pavilions (does calling her will contrive to evolve equally "Molly” rather than “M. M.” disingenuous ways of entering | make you feel in the know?) and as many books as they think Angus W ilson’s The Old Men at should be entered. the Zoo in common? They are This year 41 publishers] all novels, or sequences of submitted novels, some less novels, with large lists of household names than Cape. characters and exotic locations They included Brilliance Books, (the London Zoo has to be D aedalus, Prosperity Pubik- exotic, and Cambridge) and cations. St Pancras Press, thus they are all currently Sheba, Sinclair Browner "Spring- appearing, or shortly to appear, wood Books and Virtuoso on television in dramatized Books. Clearly, whatever the | form. state of the novel, fiction Therefore their paperback publishers are alive and eager. publishers are printing lots of copies docked out with tele­ ★ ★ ★ vision tie-in covers. Does this represent more the power and This month Private Eye'i I influence of the novel, the Oxford Book of Pseuds is being | printed word - where would published, with the familiar, television be without such classical Oxford University! elaborate series? Or of the Press typography and a dark I image, film - where would the blue cover. "Tastefully printed! book trade be these days and bound”, as advertisements| without endless television tie- in the trade press say. ins? The only snag is that the! publisher is not OUP but Andrc| ★ ★ ★ Deutsch with Private live. Robin Deniston, Oxford's gcn-l You would imagine that an eral and academic publisher,[ author, even in the States, has written to Lord Gnome! would be quietly delighted that begging him to change tliel his publisher had done a first book’s title in case it isl printing in hardback of 80,000 mistaken for a proper OUP| copies of his latest novel, and anthology. gone back to press with a This will be one o f the last! further 25,000 within a week of Private Eye books to be co-T publication. Peter Blatty, author published with Deutsch as| o f The Exorcist, wanted further Chatto & Windus are to take| to be loved, and is suing the over their distribution in the New York Times for $5m. in latter part of next year. punitive damages plus $lm. in compensatory damages for E. J. Craddocl 11 Northburgh Street London EC1V0JL ■01-251 4918

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Paperbacks 1 Lace Shirley Conran (Penguin £2.50) 2 The Prodigal Daughter Jeffrey Archer (Coronet £2.50) 3 The Holy Blood and The Holy Grail Michael Baigent, Henry Lincoln and Richard Leigh (Corgi £2.50) 4 The Angels Weep WilburSmith (Pan£1.95) 5 The Long Voyage Back Luke Rhinehart (Granada £1.95) 6 Schindler's Ark Thomas Keneally (Coronet £2.50) 7 The Miller's Dance Winston Graham (Fontana £1.95) 8 Spellbinder Harold Robbins (NEL£2.50) 9 Windfall Desmond Bagley (Fontana £1.75) 10 A Boy's Own Story Edmund White (Picador£2.50) AAn fewS 0$-%'% Taut nerves, hope and despair colleagues of the African National are not revealed so that those still Death is Part of the Process, by Hilda Congress have received life sentences, free and in .hiding are thrown into Bernstein, Sinclair Browne, 1983, though there was not one death as a disarray, not knowing who has been hbk £7.95 result of their actions. At that time taken and, more importantly, who the regime ignored, as it always has talked. Some talk immediately ONE IS im m ediately caught up in' this ignores, the opportunity for peaceful during police interrogation, some are story of a handful of protagonists, change and now faces armed con­ tricked and ruined, and death by black, Indian and white, who, over frontations, bloodshed and death. torture comes obscenely to one who 20 years ago, switched from years of Hilda Bernstein writes in a con­ won't talk. But I do not want to give non-violent struggle in South Africa trolled taut style. There is meticulous too many details of the story. to the sabotage of targets which attention to detail in the description The writing is as evocative of would not cause loss of life. The of the planning, the making of the Africa as Karen Blixen’s O ut o f Selection of electricity pylons and explosive devices, the tension and Africa. Hilda Bernstein writes: goods trains shows how deeply non­ the pumping of adrenalin when the Air and water alike lay against violence was part of the make-up of bombs are set in place. One is always them heavy and soft as silk those who believed in and fought for aware of the armed menace of the against their skins. Sea and sky a free and independent country for police and the army, lying in wait; and rain and river merged into all South Africans. one experiences the despair latent in one, merged into the night, The blowing up of a pylon, a forgotten fingerprinted torch, the became the darkness itself, hold­ plunging a city into darkness, would, lighting of a cigarette which leads to ing the whole world. it was believed, shock the regime and capture, unspeakable torture at the My only negative criticism is that its white supporters into a realisation hands of the security police and the townships and the white suburbs of the absolute inhumanity of apart­ years of imprisonment. do not come to life. The struggle heid and would bring about funda­ With the arrest of the first group takes place against a reported back­ m ental change. It is for acts such as of saboteurs, nationwide arrests drop and not in the seething, living these that Nelson Mandela and his follow. The names of those detained city. But to criticise is to cavil. This is a moving and exciting novel. In Cassim, the teenaged Indian, who is helping his uncle to escape after breaking out of prison, lies the con­ tinuation of the struggle - a bloody struggle with death as part of the process, leading ultimately to libera­ tion and life. Phyllis Altman (2

DEATH IS PART OF carry the blame for the break­ up of the ‘cell’ the natural THE PROCESS______candidate is the somewhat by Hilda Bernstein______self-willed, womanisingSipho. (Sinclair Browne £7.95) Against that, however, Thabo, the other African, is reliable, ISBN 0 86300 028 2 dependable, conscientious — The late 1950s and 1960s reminiscent perhaps of the marked a transition in the ‘faithful servant’? attitude of the African In spite of any criticism National Congress in South that one might have Hilda Africa. It had been borne in Bernstein has done tremen­ upon members of the dous service in reminding us Congress that non-violent that whatever of the gestures opposition had not and as far of the present South African as could be seen, would not Government in its attempt to make any impact on the win international approval, entrenched minority white the regim e is as oppressive, government. Hilda Bernstein brutal and harsh as ever. in her novel speaks of the end Sithembile Zulu of this transition period when Congress members began to use sabotage while being careful, as the present THE HERPES MANUAL President Oliver Thambo by Sue Blanks and______testified in a recent interview for the Guardian (6/8/83), to Carole Woddis______avoid the taking of life. (Wigmore £2.99)______She looks at this radical action through men and Reading through the Herpes women participants from the Manual again reminded me of different racial groups. In my feelings about herpes pre­ chapters devoted to indi­ catching it — mainly fear, viduals she follows the ignorance and not wanting to planning and the carrying out know. Coming to terms with of acts of sabotage; the herpes means facing up to ferreting out of the con­ attitudes like that, in our­ spirators by the police; the selves and others. imprisonment and their Unlike most conventional brutal torture. medical approaches to illness, I feel, however, that the Herpes Manual begins at perhaps Hilda Bernstein fails this point — the different to underline fully the horror feelingB and concerns of of the apartheid system . We sufferers from their first are shown the problems and attack onwards, closely trials of those who attempt to following the herpes sufferer’s take radical action, but the own experience. Drawing ‘ordinary’ life of Africans — upon their work in the Herpes the m otivating cause for such Association, Sue and Carole radical action — we glimpse carefully describe the differ­ only briefly. The attitude of ent ways herpes can affect whites is typified in the people depending on our attitude of Pila’s parents general health, circumstances, when faced with the evidence feelings and knowledge of of their daughter’s involve­ ourselves. The book describes ment in radical action. But in detail the virus, how it is we see little of th e daily near­ passed on and treatments enslavement of the African, available. There is also a very Asian and mixed race groups. good section on alternative Perhaps, understandably, remedies and preventive Hilda Bernstein is more at measures which sufferers have ease when writing about the used, and many of us rely feelings and anxieties of upon. white conspirators and their Throughout the book families and is less sure when there is a very positive feeling it comes to writing about which comes from the stress other groups. on our need to take control It may be nit-picking, but of our own health and learn I am left with a feeling, as an from our bodies. Although African, that Hilda Bernstein not specifically written for for all her sympathy and women, the book reflects work for a non-racial South Sue and Carole’s concern with African society still retains — their own health as women, and again understandably — and confronts some of the vestiges of the stereotyping particular fears relating to which labels the African man pregnancy and cervical cancer as irresponsible and pro­ for women sufferers. There is miscuous. So th at if a not a separate section for whipping boy is needed to lesbian and gay sufferers but London. Browne. 1983 294 biz Oorspron- ...... r.a rt'n f th e process

vesugt op een groot actueel prc AC Bolman-Bloem. (Imp Nilsson & Lamm. Weesp) 4209 Sinclair egiro N 168 10 Archwc - k GB-LONDOI m ste rd am nr 43.51.06.201 enstandsbank . . . _i, rAllolvlJ m s te rd Udl a m 11 Rekeningnr 69.81.10.463

Subject; Review Referentie JJS/gg D a tum Oct. 18, 1983

Dear Sir or Madam,

Please find enclosed a clipping from

Review Service and Purchasing Office Dutch Public Libraries

containing a review of the book you sent us for review purposes.

You will find our translation below. The review is too long/too technical to translate. It is favourable/moderate/unfavour^M «=>.

Yours sincerely, Nilsson & Lamm bv

Enel(s).

H. Bernstein DEATH IS PART OF THE PROCESS The various characters, black and white, participating in South African resistance have had their fill of the brutal repression of the black majority by the State Police and the Laws. Notwithstanding the risk of imprisonment, torture and a lack of adequate means they wage their rather hopeless struggle. There is no lack of suspense in this resistance novel, even though the element of an exposure predominates, which is hardly to be wondered considering the facts presented. Whether these are all the facts is difficult to judge for an outsider but there is no doubt that the regime offends against human rights in at least the same degree as communism. Apart from the difficulty in judging we have here a moving and suspenseful novel concerning an urgent contemporary problem. We got quite a good order from the libraries and ordered in our turn from Dent. BRITISH BOOK NEWS is s u e OCT 1983 65 DAVIES STREET i nMnnw w iv oaa DATED i Hilda Bernstein Death Is Part of the Process ■Sinclair Browne 1983 £7.95 (0 86300 028 2) 296p

'This excellent novel is the first recipient of the Sinclair Prize for | '•Fiction given to a previously unpublished novel of ‘high literary | quality’ and ‘contemporary social and political relevance’. It makes a distinguished beginning for the award. The passion of commit­ ment behind this story set in South Africa and chronicling the progressive growth of violence in the campaign against apartheid is matched only by the tightness of artistic control over the dramatiz­ ation of the clash of oppressor and oppressed. Hilda Bernstein works with a kind of frenzy of artistic restraint building a novel that compels attention. Though the author has written about South Africa previously in The Terrorism of Torture (1977), For Their Triumphs and for Their Tears (1978) and Steve Biko (1978), this is her first work of fiction. It is one that can be favourably measured against the standards set by Doris Lessing and Nadine Gordimer in their fine African novels. The novel is concerned with the beginnings of the internal South African terrorist movement against apartheid in the early 1960s. Frustrated by the authorities in their attempts at peaceful protest a small group in Johannesburg rejects the heritage of Gandhi and moves from passive resistance to active sabotage. The novel closely follows a small number of the initial group as their activity goes underground and their capacity for political violence develops. All races and classes are repesented: the guilty rebellious daughter of a complacent white family, whose rich father is an associate of government ministers: the Indian law student whose innate gentle­ ness wars with his need for justice; the black African of grave dignity who masterminds the successful disruption of the country’s energy supplies. Bernstein traces the complexities behind the motivations of the conspirators and, with the inevitability of tragedy, shows the diversity of their punishments as one by one they are caught and tortured by the police. ‘There are no innocent people,’ says one of the characters, who is instrumental in settir" the events in motion. Hilda Bernstein makes her point wil uence in this eminently successful novel about heroism in tl of enormous adversity. Kate Fullbrook \ b \ A k j ^ Antony Beevor has already been proffered in (1983, Allen Lane), « J n r ( jL w (' 9" % > . Under the Skin The Faustian Pact 0 ’ the end of white domination in Zimbabwe, formerly Rhodesia. Cape 1983 £7.50 (0 224 02083 8) 208p What is curious about the new novel is that so grand a scheme, so inherently interesting a canvas, should be presented in so banal a It’s easy to know what Antony Beever doesn’t like; Guards officers, fashion. Caute seems to think, in common with many contemporary practically every member of the British security services, politi­ writers, that no theme can for long hold a reader’s interest without cians, civil servants, senior police officers and terrorists. This some leavening of blood’n’ guts, sex and sweat, cruelty and carnage. presumably leaves only the long-suffering rest of us, so let us hope No one denies that these things existed in the last days of white that the author likes his readers enough to leave them out of it. rule in Ian Smith’s illegal regime. They have dominated and do Beevor does write well. He has a sense of timing and a grasp of the dominate lives everywhere to an unseasonable degree. What I official world which lends his novels authenticity. His For Reasons question is Caute’s purpose in using them here. Are we supposed to of State (1981, Cape) has surface realism and pace. His present see some sort of metaphor in a black man, Willy, raping a while novel has the same ingredients but a more exacting schedule. The lesbian mother-of-three, Sonia? If so, what is it, apart from cliches reader must be persuaded of the following facts: the Prime of returning the past with interest, symbolizing the black return to Minister, bearing an uncanny resemblance to James Callaghan, is power and the ruthlessness of man versus woman? We could have kidnapped by terrorists; the security forces lurch from stasis to guessed that, I think, and it cheapens attempts to understand total apathy; the right-wing terrorists masquerade as left wing Zimbabwe’s genuine dilemma in the years 1979-80. To do Caute terrorists and only one man notices; the French liaison security justice, he does offer balances and credit to both sides, but his service contains cliched Frenchmen, the German liaison cliched presentation of the issues is too extreme. Extremes there were, but Germans and so on; the chief British investigator achieves a not invariably. With his fictional polarities of randy, arrogant massive reputation by saying little and doing nothing; the British Charles Laslet, his lesbian wife Sonia, her weak liberal brother liaison officer is more concerned with the collapse of his marriage; Howard, the hellcat actress Tricks and the nazified thug Bekker while the Prime Minister’s personal secretary goes home to dinner representing the whites; and Willy the psychopath, Hector the on the day of the kidnap . .. Within the fiendish plot to expose the black pragmatist, Wonderful the guerrilla leader and an assortment fiendish plot is another fiendish ... suffice it to say that the Prime of anonymous natives representing the blacks, Caute cannot avoid Minister dreamt it all up to stay in office, the establishment closed oversimplification. What we have is bad fiction masquerading as ranks because it agreed with him, no one noticed, not a journalist incisive analysis, and it won’t wash. Caute is capable of better. stirred, and the Brit, who suspected the plot selflessly shot himself Bryn Caless ^ ^ ^ n d the whole thing. That was after the SAS went in, of course, these things are possible, one supposes, but even my elastic Meira Chand imagination boggles when asked to believe it all and simultaneously. The Bonsai Tree Bryn Caless Murray 1983 £8.50 (0 7195 4007 0) 240p Hilda Bernstein The Bonsai Tree is the work of a sensitive and meticulous writer - D?ath Is Part of the Process author of The Gossamer Fly and Last Quadrant - and one used to Sinclair Browne 1983 £7.95 (0 86300 028 2) 296p understanding the cultural conflicts that face an intelligent foreig­ ner trying to absorb herself into Japanese society with its complex This excellent novel is the first recipient of the Sinclair Prize for values. Meira Chand is herself of mixed extraction, Swiss and Fiction given to a previously unpublished novel of ‘high literary Indian; married to an Indian businessman, she has lived in Japan quality’ and ‘contemporary social and political relevance’. It makes for twenty years. The Bonsai Tree (the tree is a dwarf that has to a distinguished beginning for the award. The passion of commit­ be clipped and wired to conform to a Japanese horticultural ment behind this story set in South Africa and chronicling the aesthetic) is the story of Kate, a well educated and independent progressive growth of violence in the campaign against apartheid is English girl who marries a young businessman, Jun, of the Japanese matched only by the tightness of artistic control over the dramatiz­ upper class during his research visit to Britain. She returns with ation of the clash of oppressor and oppressed. Hilda Bernstein him to Japan only to find their Westem-style love-match deeply works with a kind of frenzy of artistic restraint building a novel resented by Jun’s sternly matriarchal mother, Itsuko, who lives that compels attention. Though the author has written about South only in terms of long-entrenched social tradition. When Kate Africa previously in The Terrorism of Torture (1977), For Their discovers that Jun, like many men of his position and wealth, has a Triumphs and for Their Tears (1978) and Steve Biko (1978), this mistress and child, her shocked attempt to break away from him is her first work of fiction. It is one that can be favourably measured and assert a form of independence, still little known for married against the standards set by Doris Lessing and Nadine Gordimer in women in Japan, leads to a highly dramatic outcome. Apart from ^ f e ir fine African novels. its considerable psychological interest, the novel at times assumes ^ ^ F h e novel is concerned with the beginnings of the internal South an almost documentary quality in its detailed description of African terrorist movement against apartheid in the early 1960s. Japanese ceremonial and, more important, its revelation of the Frustrated by the authorities in their attempts at peaceful protest condition of women in Japan, and the exploitation of only too many a small group in Johannesburg rejects the heritage of Gandhi and in accepted forms of prostitution, as well as the appalling conditions moves from passive resistance to active sabotage. The novel closely of poverty and degradation that faces both men and women in the follows a small number of the initial group as their activity goes ‘drop-out’ ghettos of the big industrial cities. The Bonsai Tree is a underground and their capacity for political violence develops. All considerable achievement both as novel and as social document; it races and classes are repesented: the guilty rebellious daughter of a is written in a style of rare elegance that matches the unusual complacent white family, whose rich father is an associate of demands of its subject Roger Manuell government ministers: the Indian law student whose innate gentle­ ness wars with his need for justice; the black African of grave Samuel Charters dignity who masterminds the successful disruption of the country’s Mr Ja b i and M r Smythe energy supplies. Bernstein traces the complexities behind the Marion Boyars 1983 £7.95 (0 7145 2779 3) 192p motivations of the conspirators and, with the inevitability of tragedy, shows the diversity of their punishments as one by one This moving and excellently written first novel by an established they are caught and tortured by the police. ‘There are no innocent author of poetry and books largely on jazz and the blues stems from people,’ says one of the characters, who is instrumental in setting observations made during research visits to former British colonies the events in motion. Hilda Bernstein makes her point with in West Africa. Mr Jabi is a retired, British-trained schoolmaster in eloquence in this eminently successful novel about heroism in the an impoverished, under-developed village in a country which has face of enormous adversity. Kate Fullbrook had ten years of independence. Mr jSmythe is a retired colonial district commissioner, a dedicated worker on behalf of African local David Caute welfare and economic development, and once based for twenty The K-Factor years in Jabi’s village. Forcibly retired at the age of fifty, after Michael Joseph 1983 £8.95 (0 7181 2260 7) 224p independence, Smythe has suffered severe deprivation with the loss of his life’s work and, after ten years in England, the death of David Caute is here presenting his fifth novel, though the theme his beloved wife, Beverly. He finds that he can no longer keep away

Literature, Fiction Literature, Fiction ~ fbcov. N£.Ia£>______Hilda Bernstein I ^* 5 3 Death Is Part of the Process Sinclair Browne 1983 £7.95 (0 86300 028 2) 296p

This excellent novel is the first'recipient of the Sinclair Prize for Fiction given to a previously unpublished novel of ‘high literary quality’ and ‘contemporary social and political relevance’. It makes a distinguished beginning for the award. The passion of commit­ ment behind this story set in South Africa and chronicling the progressive growth of violence in the campaign against apartheid is matched only by the tightness of artistic control over the dramatiz­ ation of the clash of oppressor and oppressed. Hilda Bernstein works with a kind of frenzy of artistic restraint building a novel that compels attention. Though the author has written about South Africa previously in The Terrorism of Torture (1977), For Their Triumphs and for Their Tears (1978) and Steve Biko (1978), this is her first work of fiction. It is one that can be favourably measured against the standards set by Doris Lessing and Nadine Gordimer in their fine African novels. The novel is concerned with the beginnings of the internal South African terrorist movement ogninut apartheid in the early 1980s. Frustrated by the authorities in their attempts at peaceful protest a small group in Johannesburg rejects the heritage of Gandhi and moves from passive resistance to active sabotage. The novel closely follows a small number of the initial group as their activity goes underground and their capacity for political violence develops. All i races and classes are repesented: the guilty rebellious daughter of a complacent white family, whose rich father is an associate of government ministers: the Indian law student whose innate gentle­ ness wars with his need for justice; the black African of grave dignity who masterminds the successful disruption of the country’s energy supplies. Bernstein traces the complexities behind the motivations of the conspirators and, with the inevitability of tragedy, shows the diversity of their punishments as one by one they are caught and tortured by the police. ‘There are no innocent people,’ says one of the characters, who is instrumental in setting the events in motion. Hilda Bernstein makes her point with eloquence in this eminently successful novel about heroism in the face of enormous adversity. Kate Fullbrook (Alison and Busby £2.95) by Anthony Barnett on the Falk- lands, and Grenada: The Apartheid tale Struggle Against Destabilis­ ation (Writers and Readers £3.95) by Chris Searle. The first trade union annual of best of year stories, poems, photos, came out, edited by Rick Gwilt and "IT WAS the same delectable hard — apartheid is an abomin­ called 1983 (Lancashire Trades world in which she had grown ation that must be consigned to Council £1), The Tidy House: up, full of visual delights and the dustbin of history. Social and Little Girls Writing by Carolyn tangible comforts; it was like political relevance combine here Steadman (Virago £4.95), The | living in a great glass ball, with high literary ability and for NHS: A Picture of Health I polished by others, from which these very qualities it won a (Lawrence and Wishart £3.95) all that was sordid or distasteful literary prize. by Steve Illffe, The Rattle Rag had been excluded.” This is a searing indictment of (Faber £4.95) edited by Sea­ ( This is a reflection by a young a system of society, also a grip­ mus Heaney and Ted Hughes white South African wife on ping story in its own right, hold­ and The City of Capital . making a return to the home in ing one breathless as to the out­ (Blackwell £6.50) by Jerry I whidh she was born. She is Pila, come. Coakley and Laurence Harris. I a character in Hilda Bernstein’s Another winner published In line with the Star’s pension­ Death is Part of the Process earlier in the year was Sassa- ers’ campaign: Capitalism and I (Sinclair Browne, £7.95), the frass, Cypress & Indigo, a first the Construction of Old Age best novel published this year novel by Ntozake Shange, a cele­ (Macmillan £4.95) bv Chris and to appear in paperback in bration of togetherness, black­ April 1984. ness, in which a mother and her three daughters hymn the glory The time is the '60s with the of woman hood. focusi on a mixed group attempt­ The title gives the names of ing sabotage of railways and Hilda Effania’s offspring, born government buildings in a bid to in Charleston, South Carolina, break the grip of apartheid. all four affirming, though they go Each one is incisively drawn: through the joys and sorrws of Indres, escaped from prison, on this world, that life is for claim­ the run, seeking to warn others ing, reaching out for. Phillipson and at the other of betrayal; Tlhabo, after years All threa girls receive endless end of the age scale, a child­ of precarious legality, having to warmth and support from Mama, ren’s parable Prudie Finds Out disguise himself as the Rev. ever concerned, knowing the (Pandora £3.50) by Natania Tomas Khumalo; Ralph and traps, pointing the pitfalls. The and Litza Jancz. Dick abandoning The Council, a telling is lit with the lilt of Pluto Press’ expanding series I university liberal protest forum poetry, abrim with vitality and Arguments for Socialism which they recognise is giving the joy of life. Her publisher (generally £2.50) offers a wide the world a false impression of tells me there will be more from range of possibilities; Peter democracy. Ms. Shange in the early part of Kingsford’s The Hunger Mar­ the New Year. chers in Britain 1920-40 Their respective wives, Margie The best collection of con­ (Lawrence and Wishart £12.50) and Pila, initially shielded from temporary short stories came could go with Jeremy Sea- . a full knowledge of what is go- from Alice Munro in The Moons brook’s Unemployment (Pala­ I ing on, are eventually caught up of Jupiter (Allen Lane, £7.95). A din £2.50). and finally, an i in the action. There is April who lesser talent would expand each unusual but welcome volume. has opted for life in a cave of these into a novel. For after The Left and the Erotic , rather than conform to the im­ each of them you are left think­ edited bv Eileen Phillips (Law­ possible restrictions; and the hot- ing of the alternatives, conjuring rence gnd Wishart £3.95). \ headed Sipho who turns ludas. with how different it might have been. Around these characters the The place names—Dalgeish in ' savagery of the system, its active MORNINC STAR Western Ontario, Edmonton, WILLIAM RUST HOUSE ( executants in the police a-d sec­ Toronto, Winnipeg—give a geo­ 75 Farrlngdon Rd.. London. EC1M SJX urity services mouthing their in­ graphical dimension. But the 01-405 9242 (IS llnai) human morality while inflicting emotions, hopes and yearnings Registered as a newspaper at the GPO the most hideous torture on expressed know no boundaries. Telegraphic Address Morsta. London. their victims. Eddie Woods EC1 The author’s stance is rock Death is Part o f the Process. By Hilda The central character is a young Bernstein, Sinclair Browne, 1983. Indian, recently fescaped from jail, but 293pp there are also several Africans, a young while woman and a white couple who This political novel, set in South Africa all eventually become involved either in in the early 1960’s, describes the activi­ sabotage attempts or in helping each ties of a racially-mixed group of South other to hide or escape. Several mem­ Africans who, frustrated by the failure bers of the group are arrested and tor­ of non-violent protests against apart­ tured and under extreme pressure, some heid, determine upon a course of sabo­ betray their fellows. However, the final tage. message is one of hope as the Indian

escapes across the border and we know lectures about the South African^sys- that much more dramatic acts of sabo­ tem, even when put in the mouths o', her tage are to follow in later years. characters, add nothing to the stor.L, but It appears that the author’s aim is to rather reduce its dramatic content. The make the reader aware of the incredible psychological aspect is also somewhat pressures under which all non-whites, lacking, for example in the relationships but especially the Africans live in South between the different members of the Africa, and the sophisticated and cruel group. One is tempted, perhaps unfair­ methods by which the authorities pre­ ly, since this is a different type of novel, vent any form of protest or change. This to compare this novel with some o f those message is conveyed very vividly of Nadine Gordimer, who conveys a through the medium of an exciting similar message with greater subtlety. story. However, at times the author is unnecessarily didactic; comments and Elaine Hansen # Journal of African Marxists

57 Caledonian Road, London S’l 9DN I .K. A NEW GRAFTON PAPERBACKS ANITA RROOKNER FAMILY AND FRIENDS BROOKNER HAS A MERCILESS COMIC GIFT.’ Sunday Times ‘A classic... She is a writer of bewitching readability.' The Times *2.50 DIANA STAINFORTH Bird of Paradise An epic, compelling romantic novel, set in bet ween-the-wars Britain: 'touchingly true’. Mai! on Sunday *3-50 JENNIFER CHAPMAN Mysterious Ways By the author of The Long Weekend, a novel of contemporary dilemmas with ‘verve, wit and no little poignancy’. Daily Telegraph *2.50 HILDA BERNSTEIN DEATH IS PART OFTHE PROCESS

A gripping political thriller, set in South Africa, soon to be a BBC television film. ‘1 ... completely authentic.' David Caute ‘A novel that had to be written.'James Cameron £2.50 GEM EE IN ROTH Breaking Free from Compulsive Eating A self-help book that holds the key to freedom for all who are held hostage by obsessive eating patterns. £2.95 KENNETH GARDNIER Creole Caribbean Cookery Savour the authentic tdste of the West Indies in this unique, colour* illustrated book. f3 95

PHILIP K. DICK The Man Whose Teeth Were All Exactly Alike A bizarre and dazzling novel by ‘one of the most original practitioners writing any kind of fiction’. Sunday Times £2.95 Solzhenitsyn: A Biography ‘This superb biography will certainly be the standard account of the most remarkable literary life story of our time.' The T.L.S. *9-95 N.H.H. SITWELL Outside the Empire: The World the Romans Knew Throws new and stimulating light on classical history. £3.95 GRAFTON BOOKS A Division of the Collins Publishing Group Hilda Bernstein, whose highly realistic book has been filmed for television, tells Rosalie Horner of her conviction that South Africa must change, and that the time^for reform has run out 7 *> ‘Trying to reform apartheid is the limit of absurdity’

THE political turbulence of foundations for what is hap­ “Britain can’t stand to one events in Southern Africa pening now.” side as, say, Sweden could, nightly dominates our tele­ Although written as fiction, because of its historical in­ vision screens, a testament to Bernstein’s book is factually volvement with South Africa the fact that what is happen­ based and reflects her in­ and its current investments. ing there is one of the most volvement and knowledge of People in Britain are deeply significant social upheavals the anti-apartheid movement. involved. After all, Britain taking place within a com­ Keen to write about what was was responsible in the first munity anywhere in the happening underground at place for setting up the South world. that time in South Africa, she African constitution in 1913 News and current affairs wrote it as fiction to protect with a colour bar included in people instinctively recog­ those involved. it. Britain is not a disinter­ nised this and have treated Both Hilda and her hus­ ested specatator. South Africa as a major story. band Lionel “Rusty” Bern­ “Mrs Thatcher keeps on Not so tele vision dram a stein, an architect, were about the reforms that have which so far has been tardy jailed in South Africa in the taken place in South Africa in reflecting this undoubtedly early sixties for their beliefs. in recent years. Trying to dramatic situation. Hilda was detained in prison reform apartheid is the limit All that will change on Sun­ for five months, seeing her of absurdity. You c an ’t day, September 28 when BBC four children only once in reform what is fundamentally 1 begins a highly realistic that time. Her youngest was evil. You couldn’t reform then only three. Rusty was on Nazism. two-part film, shot in Kenya, trial with Nelson Mandela of the political thriller, but was acquitted through “The time for reform has Death Is Part Of The Process, lack of evidence. Later he run out. There is only one by H ild a B ernstein. The question now and that is the book, set in the early sixties, was picked up again and imprisoned under tne 90-day question of power. There is tells of the decision of the Af­ no way on earth that rican National Congress — law. They fled South Africa on Thatcher, Reagan or Botha banned by the government in can put an end to the revolu­ 1960 — to form a unit known foot one night in 1964. Hilda says this would have been tion of the people, the young as the Spear of the Nation people in South Africa. There made up of dedicated oppo­ impossible without the help of the ANC. Their four child­ is no way it is going to be nents to the apartheid stopped.” regime. Its object was to sab­ ren, then aged from 21 down Hilda Bernstein — picture by Kenneth Saunders otage key government to eight, joined them in “I was arrested in the first installations. London shortly afterwards. Clive Sinclair. The £5,000 brought her book to the small children. During her deten­ half of the ANC of which she state of emergency in 1960 “At that stage our lives in award was to go to an unpub­ screen. tion she and a few other is a member. and this ties up with what is Now, two decades on, the Her delight, however, is not happening now. The condi­ book is particularly relevant South Africa had reached a lished novel “of great literary women were known as No one in Britain watches dead end,” she says. “We had merit of social or political just an author’s understand­ “double detainees,” meaning the current events in South tions under which we were to what is taking place in significance.” able pleasure in the popular­ that their husbands were also held for five months seemed South Africa today. Although no work, no communication Africa more keenly than with people we had known all “Once I read the book,” ising of her book. She sees it in gaol at the same time. Hilda Bernstein and no one to us to be horrendous but the ANC’s first endeavours as an acknowledgment of the there is no way you can com­ against the government our lives, and no money. My says Terry Coles, “ I was “We were all women with has more contempt for what husband had just had a very struck by wnat a good, power­ desperate, and so far unsuc­ she sees as Mrs Thatcher’s pare them with what is hap­ ended in disaster, they estab­ children and we discussed pening today in a similar harrowing experience of 90 ful, and exciting story it was. cessful, fight which the our obligation to them over self-interested posturings lished the basis of the cur­ majority of South Africans — state of emergency. They rent opposition to apartheid days in gaol — he was then It is set in an area which is and over again,” she says. over economic sanctions. out on bail — and I think he veiy important at the moment the blacks — have had for “People who have asked for were amateurs at it, the state, in South Africa. “But we all agreed that, in the police, the authorities. felt he could not face up to so it is very relevant to what’s nearly 30 years to establish the circumstances, we sanctions have never claimed “The ANC’s chosen course another period in prison. I happening in South Africa basic human rights. they will bring down apar­ of action became absolutely couldn’t have acted in any “We were the first large knew I was going to be today. When the Government “Everything in South Africa other way. You don’t teach theid,” she says. “Imposing group of politically conscious inevitable when all legal arrested. We decided it was banned the ANC, any form of is political,” she says. “For sanctions is one more way of people to be picked up and paths were closed to those of morality to children by impossible to continue lead­ political expression became example, the question of preaching to them but by isolating South Africa. The arrested en masse and they us working against apart­ ing this half life. You are not illegal. That sowed the seeds street lighting in Soweto. The only way that change will heid,” says Hilda Bernstein, what you show them of your learned a lot about how to part of politics, your family of today’s unrest. This is the city council has to give per­ own deeds. I am very happy come is when the big com­ handle political people from a small, intense 71-year-old or your work. You are doing first film about South Africa mission for that, but whites panies like Plessey and ICI those days. Today detainees who these days lives in a with the way my children nothing, just concealing your­ made specially for television are not going to vote extra have turned out. They all are more frightened by what are tortured and physically recently converted farm­ self from the police.” in recent years.” money for something like that will happen to them house in Wales where her share our views. They are all abused in the most terrible Alan Plater, one of televi­ Apart from Art Malik, star which will not affect them. very beautiful and adorable.” financially through this isola­ ways. There are no innocent main occupation is painting. sion’s finest writers, has of The Jewel In The Crown The blacks are voiceless tion than by negotiating with victims as far as the whites “The ANC always set its adapted Hilda Bernstein’s and The Far Pavilions, most without representation. So During her years in Britain, thp hlsplrc are concerned — the children face against individual ter­ book. The project was initiat­ of the leading parts are they start organising, especi­ Hilda Bernstein has become “Realism demands that maybe — but the adult whites rorism, she continues. “The ed by the producer, Terry played by South African ally the women, in extra- one of the most vocal and elo­ these big companies must are not innocent, they are only person to be killed in Coles, who first learned actors. parliamentary ways.” quent opponents of the apar­ stop investing in Botha and part of the system.’* those early years was one of about the book in 1983 when H ild a B ernstein is When she lived in South theid regime outside South start investing in the people our own people who blew Death Is Part Of The Process delighted at the way Terry Africa, Hilda Bernstein says Africa, campaigning vigor­ who are going to be in charge Death Is Part Of The Process himself up with his own won the Sinclair Prize, set up Coles, Alan Plater, and the she put politics first, before ously in this country and trav­ of South Africa in the is published in paperback bomb. I know that we laid the by the computer magnate, Sir director Bill Hays, have everything else, even her elling abroad lecturing on be­ future,” she continues. tomorrow by Grafton Books. PAGE 17

Out of South Africa by the back door EWS blackouts from son Mandela, Walter Sisulu N South Africa prevent and seven others during an us from glimpsing illegal meeting in their under­ much beyond first­ ground headquarters. hand government lies and “People often ask me why I went to live in South Africa surreptitious second-hand and took a stand against apart­ accounts of its brutal heid," says Bernstein, now a regime. compact and spritely white- Tomorrow night’s powerful haired woman. and chilling Death is Part of “My question is why aren’t the Process (BBCl, 9.0pm), a there more whites like us. To thriller in two part*) (part two live in and enjoy that beautiful is screened next Sunday) country without opposing its should right the balance. institutionalised racialism is Based on Hilda Bernstein’s shocking.” prize-winning novel, the film During her five-month im­ charts the beginnings of the prisonment, she was allowed FLED: Hilda Bernstein African National Congress’s to see her four children — the armed wing, Umkono we youngest was then seven — “About 10 minutes later my Sizwe (Spear of the Nation). only once. husband yelled out to find out where I was and told me they Filmed in Kenya and star­ Upon her release, with the had come for me. I dropped ring Art Malik and a clutch of leaders of the opposition still everything, ran out the back unknown South African ac­ in jail, Hilda helped fill the door and never came back." tors, the story is based on the “vacancies left by those who personal experiences of had involuntarily abdicated". A prolific writer and tal­ ented artist, Hilda Bernstein Bernstein, aged 71 and born in “All of us in the second London, after she went there now lives with Rusty in a ranks knew that we were in converted farmhouse in Wales. to live with her South African the next line for arrest. Then husband. Rusty. She no longer has to place her my husband was released from typewriter beside the window A double-detainee — so- prison. And one day my — to keep a sharp eye out for called when husband and wife daughter told me that a friend the police — and a fire burn­ are jailed simultaneously — of ours had been arrested. ing — to bum her work should Hilda was jailed in 1961, one of “I went into hiding where I they visit. 20,000 detained without charge stayed for about 10 days until I She has been out of South after a mass burning of the couldn't tolerate it anymore Africa now for 20 years. passes which control and returned. The following movement around the country, "Leaving is a betrayal. It day 1 was doing some cooking always is. You’ve left every­ in protest over the Sharpville and washing and the phone massacre. thing you believe in, every­ rang. I knew it was the secur­ thing you fought for.” Rusty Bernstein, an ar­ ity police calling to check if I chitect, was arrested with Nel­ was there. ANGELA BROOKS PAGE 99 he washing machine was just and this is what I was writing about in going into its rinse cycle when the book — death really is part of the Hilda Bernstein and her hus­ process. band Rusty left their house in Johan­Hilda, 71, “ I feel very depressed about Nelson nesburg in 1964 at the start of an Mandela — I don’t believe they had exhaustingT and hair-raising midnight any intention of releasing him into any escape from South Africa across the real kind of freedom at all. They know border into Botswana. battles that he is the person with whom they Both had earlier been jailed for their would have to negotiate, and that activities and beliefs, Rusty having would mean talking to the ANC and, been one of the co-defendants with consequently, the end of apartheid:” Nelson Mandela in the famous Rivonia on But she reserves a lot of her anger Trial. He was released for lack of for the British government’s stand on evidence, then rearrested and held South Africa. without charge for 90 days before “I’m furious and livid with the Gov­ being let out on bail. against ernment here! Effective sanctions are Then word came that they were both vital, and should be aimed against to be arrested again and they fled, those investors who profit from and leaving behind not only the gurgling uphold the apartheid system. washing machine but also four children apartheid "The trouble is that there's not aged eight to 21 who joined them later people who had reached the end of the enough anger in Britain. It’s not as if in London. democratic procedural road. Britain is a disinterested spectator on Now Hilda Bernstein is 71. a small “ But the fact is that the results of the the scene. All this torture and repres­ and amiable woman whose cheerful­ first acts of resistance and sabotage sion and imprisonment arise out of a ness bordering on impishness belies were disastrous — within two or three totally unique system of institutional her formidable abilities and the depth years most of the leaders of organisa­ racism — the groundwork for which of her commitment to the cause of the tions like Umkonto We Sizwe (Spear was laid down by the British, ar.d then African National Congress. of the Nation) were in jail or in exile. later underpinned by British invest­ The couple lived for many years in "And people ask me why all this ment, expertise and political support.” Rothwell Street, Primrose Hill, where failure, set in the early ’60s, is relevant She also has an interesting and ori­ Hilda — without any formal training at now that things have changed so much. ginal view of the South African regime ill — developed into one of North- My answer is that it could be even being a sort of "spiritual homeland" West London’s best-known artists, her more relevant now. What happened for racists the world over who some­ etchings of African subjects and wild­ then laid the basis for today’s resist­ how take support and succour from its life proving particularly popular. ance. Everyone realised that a new existence. Remove the apartheid can­ But, perhaps more important, she method had to be found and people cer and it would mark a change in the also became a self-taught writer, pub­ had to learn themselves the hard way. world's attitude towards Africa and lishing books on the struggle of black “Without those early attempts there black people generally, she believes. women in South Africa and on the wouldn't be such organised resistance circumstances surrounding the death today, and such prestige for the She also dismisses out of hand the o f black activist Steve Biko. ANC.” so-called "reform s" of the Botha G ov­ Then, in 1983, there was a new Once the BBC had bought the film ernment. “This is not a question of departure — she published a novel rights (“I make more money from my good-natured people wanting to make called Death Is Part of the Process, etchings’’), Hilda was pleasantly sur­ amends, for heaven’s sake. which immediately won the first £5,000 prised to find that everyone involved “You can’t ■reform’ or ‘moderate’ Sinclair Prize for fiction. was anxious to keep to her original apartheid, in the same way that it was The book deals with the beginnings plot as closely as possible. She was impossible to reform or moderate o f organised armed resistance and consulted often and in the end she's Nazism! sabotage in South Africa in the early “very satisfied" with the films. "B u t in any case, what are these '60s. It is not a romantic account full of All the important exterior and loca­ so-called reforms? There’s no point in heroism and excitement, but a painful­ tion filming was done at the beginning recognising trade unions if you then ly honest account of the impulsiveness of this year in Kenya, where the coun­ put all the leaders in jail. They've of idealism and the pitfalls of amateur tryside, vegetation and some of Nairo­ pretended to abolish the pass laws, but enthusiasm. bi's suburbs strongly resemble the black people still can't live where they It caught the eye of BBC producer landscape in South Africa. want to. Terry Coles who commissioned top And, with the exception of Art TV writer Alan Plater (who lives in Malik and Hampstead-based actor "Mixed marriages are now legal, but Eton College Road, Hampstead) to Louis Mahoney (who lives in Willow there is nowhere in the country where adapt it for the box. The result will be Road) all the main actors — both a mixed couple could legally live together! And the removal of petty screened in two 75-minute episodes on black and white — are former South BBC 1 on September 28 and October Africans. apartheid regulations like having sepa­ rate entrances for Hacks in post offices 5. Her attitudes about South Africa The baoL.]toi alw-ito * -bevti pub­ today are ay tough and uncompromis­ are so trivial as to be absurd lished in paperback by Grafton Books. ing as ever. “What has to be done in South “I had to write the book as fiction "The thing that worries me is that Africa can’t be done by whites. The because all the main incidents in it the sheer number of deaths in the only people who can make meaningful actually happened, and some of the* townships is dulling people’s percep­ reforms are the black people them­ people involved are still around,” she tion of what is really happening there. selves. The people must speak, and recalled when I spoke to her last week. “At the same time I’m amazed at their voice must be heard.” “It was the beginning of a whole the behaviour of the young people who new era of resistance on the part of are so prepared to die for the struggle, Matthew Lewin

• Hilda Bernstein: “There’s not enough anger in Britain.” W hat’s the word?

KATHY MYERS comes in from a from talking to each other, where new TV film drama on apartheid everything you do is illegal, where political organisations cannot exist, where the conflicts and contradictions o f apartheid f the publishers had had their way. come right into the home.' Hilda Bernscein's 'Death Is Part O f Though reticent on the subject. Hilda The Process’ would have died a Bernstein was herself involved in anti- ngering death in a filing cabinet. government activities. Her husband was This controversial tale of the ANC and put under house arrest, and they finally white anti-apartheid struggle in the South left the country illegally. Many of these Africa of the "60s was deemed interesting, biographic threads, along with the broader but 'non commercial'. Bernstein, who left landscape of apartheid and the rise of the South Africa under duress in 1964. tried ANC. are painted in Death is Part of the eight publishers to no avail. Finally in-. - Process'. For a white Western audience its desperation she subm itted it to the Sinclair stren gth is th a t it puts in to crisis L-’e Brown competition for unpublished work morality of non-violence: of standing on of social or political merit. She won. Polly th e sidelines. Toynbee, one of the judges, wrote about It's a chastening film, rubbing home that it in the Guardian and BBC producer Terry to condemn apartheid from the security of Coles spotted it. The result is a two-part B ritain is in som e sense easy. T o live it, to screenplay, dramatised for TV by the be white and benefit from it while excellent radical playwright Alan Plater. subverting the system, is much more The bo ok and the subsequent screenpiay. complex and dangerous. Many of these explore the black South African struggle ambiguities are highlighted in the film. The for identity and independence. The politically conscientious university characters are fictional, but all the events p ro fesso r w h o speaks o u t against described are. she says, real. 'T h e y e ith e r apartheid while keeping a black happened to me. my family or somebody I 'houseboy'; the students who flirt with- - k n o w .' politics from the security of their parents' • Indres (Art Malik) caught between Bernstein is not an Afrikaner. Born of Cape estates: a series o f personal, political black struggle and status Jewish immigrants she left London at 16 to and dramatic tensions which focus on the go to South Africa to live with a relative. figure o f Indres ( A rt M alik), an Indian The C ro w n ' and m arries th em w ith a raw. Despite the experience o f living in a poor who's caught between black struggle and p ro file o f violence and te rro ris m as immigrant community, she was shocked the fe w fru its w hich his status in honourable pursuits. A clever combinatio- and appalled by what she saw. Johannesburg can of}er. which must force any audience to ; 'It's very hard to describe within the If this film was about Ireland and the conclude th at w hen human dig nity is a t; context of the west. But we are talking IRA. it would not have been made. stakfl. 'Death Is Part O f The Process'., • about a country where the occurrence of Powerful in the extreme, it hijacks the death is normal, where people are banned seductive production-.vafues o f 'Jewel In See N etwork: Selections for details.

m Sunday Premier: Death Is Part-* Of The Process.9.05-10-20 BBC1 : - ' SftSnu! Part 0 9 The (part one) Alan Plater's dramatisation ofr< Airfcaf 6'VleW °f black nulitancy in South Hilda Bernstein's powerful . i cr Sbuth African novel-spans theBW areSfa?et J ? ecrn^itli!f’ • writinS and production early '60s,-exploring the riseofH V of thfs t0 ^ nore- the basic premise the ANC. white militancy and the- » Plater epic—that violence is the _bite of Atrikanerdonr; Art Malite-wi 2 5 5 "? 1 outcome of political frustration— sfarras theJndiaijcaught^- i-. comes across with alarming reasonableness between European rights a n « K ^ _ . K la lr t!i6 ,fueitive hero and Jack black outlaw status, acting as »■ • is.iaai as his white adviser, steal vour svmnathv vehicle lor the plot, and fo r.- and almost blind you to the reluues o? Bernstein to explore that:-* an-eye-for-an-eye philosophy. complexities and ambiguitiesot • apartheid. Mixing pathos, pain - > and pleasure with unexpected-— powerful stabs of comedy, its » • message is clear. People with ho 2 . C . - - V rights have nothing to lose and- & sru inevitably Dedth-lsPart Of The*-. ( P i s s v i e w ) Process'. Skilful acting enabled by Bill Hays'direction; with-- JohnMatshikBa-.Jack.KlaH,*- ...* Estelle Kohler and Moira>r - i - Downie. See. Circuit foe more ; - details. Psrttwonext weeks' TotattyrecommeodecMKathy. '• *

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Alison Chapman in r bne. t o hr h 1982 Sinclair the her won It banned. are tion the and become has Africa of part its fabric. violence that ugly South of beauty breathtaking for 1964. is She in Hilda apartheid Britain to against fleeing beforeyears campaigned activist and lived she where Africa, South political remembers Bernstein writer and Herefordshire, in cottage 16th-century stone her of kitchen spacious farmhouse THE COOL, IN o t d, u oc i a while a in once but do, to joy same the sort altitude, a has high it formed a it into sequence of events.’ goesthe to back then and prisoner in around jumps it because play (the second is to be shown next Sunday). two-part Plater’s BBC1adaptation there’s Alan the out fleshing struc­ and it, storyline the rewroteleaving but characters and drawer a social merit, with or content’. political literary of high novel unpublished Prize‘an for to resort of opposi­ forms other who actsof all sabotageafter dissidents of group multiracial story of the a experiences own telling on her in into, is to found be infested maggots.with She it to likens a peach when bitten which, juicy the between contrast the by struck constantly idea that “If anything has to be done, I student the in mixedIndian group of great with it does he and villain, a a to harder always hero play than the of (ANC). Congress members National African both are personally; they him knows Bernstein Matshikiza, John who plaiys ‘hero’ the African Thabo. including can, of vegetation and so on’. in done wasis ‘which Africa:Nairobi, like South filming the of Most trans­ has Alan and did, he things escape aof the with starts It time. a into make to book ‘It difficult was 71.a now Bernstein, says rific,’ ue nat Te cm te icar n now and Sinclair the came Then intact. ture dozen or so fished Bernstein it ofpublishers, out armchair politicians that I grew up grew up I that politicians armchair the and Indresdifference between achieve; I am don’t care how far goI or how little I the commitment: huge this makes Indres,’about says, Malik ‘ishe most that me excites ‘What saboteurs. something there’squite powerful comesthat over.’ yet restraint, it’s sensethat the in part difficult impressed ame.He has ‘His acting oehn cms ln wih you which along comessomething great a and entertaining are which sees exactly where he with is at college.going. He looks at his life and Her novel, Her novel, Most of the cast are South Afri­ South are cast the of Most fe te oks nta rjcin y af a half by rejection initial book’s the After Art Malik playsIndres, youngMalik the Art ter­ is script Plater’s ‘Alan Yu e ofrd os f parts of lots offered get *You BBC1 ’s thriller set in political South is Africa a novel adapted from by Hilda Bernstein. Now 71, she still harbours a ‘fury against injustice as Veronica71, as Now Groocock she ‘fury discovers harbours still injustice a against prepared Death Is Part of the Process, the of Part Is Death ” . This . is . the Resistance writer Hilda Bernstein: still fighting against apartheid against fighting still Bernstein: Hilda writer Resistance draws Death Is Part of the Process, 9.5 BBC1 the script, I was very aware of the history and and history of the aware very was the I script, the of many from parents his been had by he protected child a as where Town, Cape in the read you into When you completely. take area to another going is actor, an as know, understand him, to get under his skin and and skin his under to get to trying in him, was actor understand an as challenge The vulnerable. but strong is He guy. brave tough, scenes I dedicatedalmost two to orpeople I One knew. powerful. incredibly was every was crying day. together. It I pieced all it ‘By readI time the him. events around on going career his began Klaff to Kohler). (Estelle Margie married who’s group the in comrade white ITV’s in Kumar Hari of part the towards same script, you say: “Yes, this I do!” must ’ He felt the Spear of Bernstein group, which with the Nation see why he behaved as he did.’ The Jewel in the Crown. the in Jewel The ot fia-on ak lf ly Dc, a Dick, plays Klaff Jack African-born South The central group is a fictional version of of version the is a fictional group The central ‘Dick is not particularly heroic, not the big, the not heroic, particularly not is ‘Dick Sunday Premiere: forerunner of what is happening today. of comesIt is forerunner what happening ‘I valid. as still are concerns and theme film’s Although trial). ‘Rivonia’ famous (the ties Rusty escapedher husband with back to Britain about than the black ones,’ says Hilda Hilda says ones,’ black the than about compost contributes to a which becomesa new dies growth. that everything that a the Peterfrom in title, out Weiss’s movement, resistance the the of of part up necessary a building as period that saw She teens. late her in Africa South in live ecie i Brsens rvos book, previous Bernstein’s in described escape ity. (Their dramatic across the frontier is releasedtechnical­ a on temporarily was Rusty imprisonment, life to sentenced was Mandela Nelson alongside trial, activi­ anti-government stood with charged Mandela, had he after Bernstein. ‘People might say: “Well, that’s that’s “Well, say: might ‘People Bernstein. World that Was Ours.) Was that World Despite its 60s setting, she believes that the that believes she60s setting, its Despite to went and London in born was Bernstein ‘I found the white characters easier to write write easierto characters white the found ‘I before the the ANC was banned. to response in formed was 60s. early It the in connected was the garden the garden gate or next door to play outside went they moment the and home, the in beliefs and moral of attitudes set one was there dren against them. around everything going are They conflict. liberation the struggle are a in state of with continuous was themselves It all. at because that white people who associate wasn’t it yourself,” but white are you natural, their comradeship and vitality, vitality, and comradeship their feeling a and humour enthusiasm, Sharpeville shootings Sharpeville of 1960, a year ih hi fins tee a a attitudes.’ and ethics was of set there different totally friends, their with against injustice,’ she says. ‘You ‘You says. she injustice,’ against fury lessening of feelyour a to not it’s ‘I ANC. terribly important think of behalf thespeak on to world the course, the sunshine.’ of . ..and, singing women’s the of openness, warmth, the their beauty people, ‘The passionately: Africa of pent-up energy. She misses South or writing, she is busy travelling travelling busy is she writing, or ar ay ilne ht s used racialism.’ • is that gratuitously against people, violence and any any fair, isthat is not any that trial polluted, river any abused, is that child any is - you society around what the in wrong about angry feel should the Process’ is published in paperback by paperback in of published is Part Process’ the Is 'Death novel Bernstein’s Hilda Grafton Books at £2.50 at Books Grafton This short, wiry woman radiates woman wiry short, This ‘For instance, with my own chil­ own my with ‘Forinstance, When sheWhen etching is painting, not 2 7 S 7 2 r e b m e t p e -3 O -3 Marat/Sade r e b o t c

6 8 9 1 The -

PREVIEW TELEVISION Sally Payne talks to Hilda Bernstein, author ofthe novel which has now become TVs firstfull-length film drama about South ______Africa.______either woman. I was right in it.’ And still is. And, what’s more, is opti­ mistic about the future of South Africa. ‘We always gave the freedom salute “Amandla”,' she says. ‘And then we’d say “in our lifetime”. In the last couple of years we’ve become convinced it’s come very, very much closer. Because there is now a realisation among young blacks that they cannot tolerate it any longer. They’re telling their parents that they won’t take what they took. Unem­ ployment for young blacks is now 50 per cent. Soldiers with guns force them into the classrooms where they’re given their “Bantu” education. Yet in spite of! it all they go out demonstrating and nov^ they’ve reached this point there’s no go1 ing back.’ So if things are precariously perched in South Africa, wouldn’t outside pres­ sure tip them neatly over the edge? ‘We are so anxious to press the cause of sanctions and boycotts,’ says Bernstein. ‘My belief is that they wouldn’t apply pressure so much to the Botha regime — that’s a lost cause anyway — but to the foreign interests who’ve got a lot to lose. It’s important that they see their future is bound up with the black people of South Africa, not with a white minority. And it’s a false assumption that the blacks would suffer under sanctions. That is raised by people who’ve never cared a damn about the suffering of thene blacks.’ * Maybe, then, this is the perfect timene i for a drama like this to be shown on teli^ vision. Maybe it’ll raise British con­ sciousness a touch. Bernstein thinks so.H ‘It’s absolutely the right time for thisiis | story to be told on TV. The early 1960s were the beginning of the change from non-violence. It was then that the basis for today’s struggle was laid. This was how they started. It was the beginning of training people, of the armed struggle. The rest of the ’60s was a period of quiescence until the move­ ment rose again with the new gener­ ation who, despite being cut off all those years from political books and meetings and free associations, were still highly politicised. An amazing thing.’ If it does touch a British nerve, then Hilda Bernstein will have played as worthwhile a part in the fight against apartheid as she ever did in Johannes­ burg. For her it will be some atonement for having upped and left her country WINDSThis Sunday the first ever cinema- hardly OF any visitors. HildaCHANGE Bernstein Hilda Bemstein is now 71, sharp, arti­ and, in a sense, her cause. ‘I have been length drama about South Africa to be reckons, however, that compared to culate and still politically active. We dis­ conscious of my betrayal ever since we televised begins on BBC1. today they had it easy. cuss the programme in her London flat. left, particularly when very close friends It is ‘Death Is Part Of The Process’, a ‘Death Is Part Of The Process’ has Outside, a group of kids are leaning on have suffered deeply over there. Our thriller set in 1960s South Africa, when been adapted by Alan Plater from the her gate, chatting: three blacks, three association with the Rivonia men — the armed struggle was in its infancy, novel. The story concerns a group of whites. In South Africa they would Nelson Mandela and so on — was a very before Nelson Mandela was tried, anti-apartheid activists (some black, a probably be arrested. In South Africa real and a very close one. And that sense before detention inevitably meant tor­ few white, one Indian) who, after the we would have to conduct the interview of betrayal never leaves you.’ ture. But not before the Special Branch non-violent ANC is banned, embark on in her bathroom with all taps running And, if she could, would she go back? had every politically active person under a policy of sabotage. Their efforts are and a radio blaring. Or perhaps in a park ‘My husband says, “only if we can be of heavy surveillance, including Hilda naive, blundering and amateurish. They somewhere, talking in whispers. Here some use.” I have the feeling I’d like to Bemstein, author of the novel on which are lackadaisical about the vast inform­ at least we can tape our conversation. go back for the people, for the sunshine, the TV drama is based. Her husband er network that operates within every We can talk in loud voices. We can for the vitality of it. The black South Rusty was the only man to be let out group in South Africa. Most of them end name names. Africans are just the most marvellous after the Rivonia Trials of 1964. The up in jail. ‘Jewel In The Crown’ star Art The two women characters in ‘Death people I have ever known.’ rest, including Mandela, are still inside. Malik plays the Indian student who, Is Part Of The Process’ are fairly peri­ This Sunday the British public will Facing inevitable re-arrest, Hilda and after being tortured by the SB (with pheral. One, middle-class, naive, white, learn about South Africa. It could push Rusty crawled under a barbed wire beatings and semi-drownings) escapes is released from jail and flown shan>ly to Hilda Bemstein one small step closer to border fence one night, their legs cut from prison; the rest of the cast are London after her establishment father seeing freedom in her lifetime, ‘For the and swollen after two days’ trudging, almost wholly South African. A special speaks to the ‘right people’. The other, time must come when law answers the their hearts virtually giving out each mention must go to Jim Parker for his also white, knows no politics until her needs of human relationship, instead of time a light appeared in the distance. terrific music — exhilarating freedom scientist husband is arrested for making being an instrument of oppression.’ Accused of subversion (they’d always songs — and to John Matshikiza who bombs. Is either character autobio­ worked against apartheid), they’d both plays Thabo, the sad-eyed, honourable, graphical? ‘Not at all. All the incidents in 'Death Is Part Of The Process’ begins on spent time in jail in the past, kept in forceful black leader whose fate had the film took place but the characters BBC1, Sunday at 9.00pm. The paperback solitary for months on a measly diet of more than one previewer swallowing are fictional. I was much more politic­ is republished this week by Grafton, mealie-meal; no books, no exercise and hard. ally involved and knowledgeable than £2.50.

38 TIMEOUT SEPTEMBER24-OCTOBER 11986 THE GUIDE

TVS’s biopic about Nelson Mandela; legacy of the British, alongside the million tourists and the Australian Harry Belafonte has apparently tennis and polo that provide such Tourist Commission estimates each already acquired the rights to Winnie perfect cover for clandestine visitor will spend more than 1,000 Mandela’s life story. For its part, the meetings—at least for the whites. ‘Ev­ Australian dollars. When added to BBC has recently brought us the ex­ erybody trusts tennis players,’ as one sponsorship and television revenue, cellent Asinamali and Drums Along of Margie’s women contacts puts it. it makes hosting the racing very big Balmoral Drive-, hard on their heels Even if they are suspected, though, business. comes Death Is Part of the Process people like Pila and Ralph can some­ The America’s Cup is a match race (Sunday BBC1 95-10.20pm), a two- times leave the country, while for between two 12-metre class yachts. part political thriller set in the wake Thabo and his comrades ‘Death is Between 31 January and 15 February of the Sharpeville Massacre as anti­ simply part of the process’. 1987 an Australian yacht will race a apartheid activists begin to recognise challenger for the Cup. The first to that peaceful protest may not be win four races will hold the bottom­ enough. SPORT less silver trophy. Round-robin and The presence of Art Malik as knockout races from October until Richard Clark on the media and Indian-law-student-turned-freedom- January 1987 will decide who de­ dollar hype surrounding the running fighter Indres is a reminder of the fends and challenges for the Cup. of yachting’s America’s Cup in Raj cycle (he played Hari Kumar in Four Australian syndicates are com­ Australia this winter. Jeu>el and Dr Aziz in Passage). But it peting for the right to represent their also reveals just how different this country against one of 13 challen­ new wave is from those end-of- High gers. The cost of the visiting cam­ Empire fictions. What we are seeing paigns is estimated at 120 million US is more than a thirst for a new brand dollars, the most extravagant being Art Malik of ‘out of Africa’ exotica. Indeed, it’s rollers those from America. significant that while the Raj revival their comrades and we viewers trust Losing the Cup has enlivened relied heavily on literary adaptations, most may turn state's evidence; those Drenched in champagne, Australian American yachting. When they lost, this South African cycle is much who seem least likely to join the Prime Minister Bob Hawke told TV the supremacy of the New York Yacht more actuality-based. Since the im­ struggle sometimes surprise us. Shot viewers: Any boss who sacks anyone Club was overturned. This year six position of stria media controls by in Kenya, Process is a brave and for not turning up today is a bum’. US syndicates are competing to bring the regime last November the news well-crafted film and demands to be Hawke, who had given up drinking the title home. The strongest chal­ has been gagged, leaving the field seen. Like the guerrilla group it fol­ some months before, was leader of a lenges come from New York and San wide open for fiction—Asinamali, for lows, however, it may have been country feeling the squeeze of reces­ Diego. New York’s past dominance instance, was shot in Johannesburg betrayed from within. sion. He no doubt recognised the put them ahead in the race for during the state of emergency. Simi­ One of Salman Rushdie’s criticisms kudos to be gained from what he corporate finance, including a one larly, Death Is Part of the Process, for of the Raj cycle was the way in which described as ‘one of the greatest mo­ million dollar donation from General all its novelistic origins, draws deeply Indians get walk-ons, but remain, for ments in Australia’s sporting history’. Motors. But much of their support on author Hilda Bernstein’s experi­ the most part, bit players in their In Sydney, people awoke on the 27 comes from individual patrons from ences in the early 1960s when the own history ... It is no defence to September 1983 to a headline in the the oil state of Texas and the money- ANC was forced underground and say that a work adopts, in its struc­ Morning Herald declaring victory in men’s southern chauvanism may cost anti-apartheid activists took up armed ture, the very ethic which, in its the America’s Cup ‘The Biggest Thing their syndicate the Cup. When the struggle— her husband was sent­ content and tone it pretends to dis­ Since Peace in 1945—Triumph Unites money talked it wanted a Texan at enced alongside Mandela in 1964 at like. It is, in fact, the case for the a Nation’. the helm of New York’s effort and the Rivonia trial. prosecution.’ Alan Plater’s adaptation The previous day off Newport, the Club selected John Kolius. That Process, in fact, is an implicit re­ and Bill Hays’s direction are careful Rhode Island, the yacht Australia II left the world’s most experienced joinder to Gandhi, focusing as it does to avoid accusations of exploiting had wrested the trophy from the USA matchracer, Dennis Conner, free to on the failure of passive resistance as ‘local colour’ (as one character puts for the first time in 132 years. Mil­ lead the San Diego bid. a strategy and the rise of armed it sourly: ‘It is a very pretty police lions of dollars had been spent to Conner was the man who lost the struggle in the war against apartheid. state’), but the perspective remains unscrew the 40-inch bolt which held America’s Cup in 1983. Folklore had In the very first scene, for instance, primarily a white one. Thus, of the the ‘Auld Mug’ trophy for the event it that the head of the skipper who Indres, having organised a human seven people at the Human Rights to its plinth in the New York Yacht surrendered the pot would replace it rights exhibition, is cynical about its Council meeting it is the three black Club. The boat with the revolutionary on display at the New York Yacht effectiveness; as the visitors begin to characters present who don’t have winged keel had shown the Amer­ Club. Spared decapitation, Conner arrive he turns to a colleague: ‘Now speaking parts. Nor is it always better icans were vulnerable. The Cup, probably feels happier steering the we wait for the government to fall.’ when they do—the writing is at its which had been a Stateside benefit, San Diego challenge and has a for- At a subsequent meeting it is pro­ weakest when characters like Thabo was now seen as attainable. posed that the Human Rights Council discuss their hopes for the future: The interest in that deciding race is simply dissolved: ‘Because it’s be­ ‘Freedom in our lifetime—that is in 1983 highlighted the event as a come an obstacle to progress—it what I want to see.’ Similarly, we money-spinner. Worldwide media contributes to the illusion that South learn much more about the home coverage had shown the financial Africa is a democratic country.’ In its and work lives of Dick and Margie possibilities that association with the place Umkhonto we Sizwe ('spear of Slater or Pila Norval than we do Cup could bring. the nation’), an underground guerril­ about Thabo, Sipho, Kabelo or even The 1987 defence is in Perth, West­ la organisation, emerges ready to do Indres. ern Australia, where a film crew from rather more to the symbols of apar­ The obvious explanation for this, TVS will be based for the five-month theid than simply litter them with of course, is simply that for Indres duration of the event. TVS have leaflets. and Thabo (brilliantly portrayed by negotiated the exclusive British use Process follows Indres and three John Matshikiza) ‘politics’ is a career of Australian coverage. They are pro­ white friends— Dick and Ralph, both in itself, a cause to which everything ducing 18 half-hour programmes for university lecturers, and Pila who else is visibly sacrificed. For them it Channel 4 and an hour long works in a bookshop— as they get is not simply a matter of living a bit documentary, Down For The Cup increasingly involved in this new dangerously’ like Pila; for Thabo and (Sunday ITV 10.30-11.30pm). struggle, counterpointing their activi­ his comrades it is never safe. Much Adrian Metcalfe, Commissioning ties with the even riskier role played of the narrative, indeed, is focused Editor for Sport on C4 describes the by black activists like Kabelo, Sipho on the group’s gradual professional- coverage as ‘an exhilarating mixture and Thabo. Over two episodes we isation in everything from bomb- of the Olympic Games and see what happens to these— and making skills to organisational struc­ Dynasty—great sport with the ex­ other—members of the movement, ture. The survivors learn that the war traordinary goings-on of the rich and as one by one they are either caught, against apartheid cannot be fought famous’. forced out of the country or under­ like a game, nor can they continue to Western Australia is a state with a ground, or tortured into betraying operate as amateurs. Amateurishness, population of fewer than two million. their colleagues. Those whom both it turns out, was perhaps the last The Cup is expected to attract half a

THE LISTENER 25 SEPTEMBER 1986 27 2 7 S e p t e m b e r -3 O c t o b e r 1 9 8 6

Circle of saboteurs: lecturer Dick Slater (Jack Kiaff), bis wife Margie (Estelle Kohler) and Indian student Indres (Art Malik) are drawn into opposition to

repressive reoime — Ian Wright Ian 26 THE HEREFORD TIMES, OCTOBER 16. 1986 Times LEISURE ART ANTIQUE & Kington Author signs book COLLECTORS FAIR artists PEOPLE who watched MALVERN WINTER GARDENS the BBC1 series “ Death is Part of the Process” WORCS. show flocked to the Hereford SUNDAY OCTOBER 19th AN exhibition of the work Bookseller in High Town, where they could not onlv 10. am — 5.00 pm of two young Kington artists has opened at the buy the book, but have it ADMISSION 25p 7 town’s Jacisa Gallery, and autographed by the author. STALLS 70+ will remain on view for most of October. Hilda Bernstein, who ALL ENQUIRIES LEDBURY 4878 The artists are the wrote the book which was gallery’s proprietors, adapted by Alan Plater Jacob Rock and Louisa for television, lives at Old Davidson, and the exhibits House Farm, Common LLANWARNE AGRICULTURAL are some of their work Bach, Dorstone. SOCIETY since they opened it six (affiliated to the British Society of months ago. The book deals with the Ploughmen) Two things are demon­ subject of apartheid in strated by the exhibition South Africa in the early — the couple’s versatility 1960’s. 44th PLOUGHING MATCH and the inspiration they * 9 V O’jjr-'*' Mrs Bernstein told Sheep Dog Trials are finding from scenes Z A ' « m X M >11 1 customers, who asked and locations along the Specimen Roots and Grain central Welsh border. Author Hilda Bernstein about the television pro- Horticultural and Domestic Classes Admission to the exhibi­ signings i n n i n a copiescomes o of t ner her duct,on.r a „ p ,eaSedthat she with was Saturday 18th October tion, which has a catalogue book Death is Part of fhc adap;atro„, bu. parts, of 51 items, is free. the Process at the sjje felt, were not quite as Hollow Farm, Dined or Hereford Bookseller in c le a r as they were Licensed Bar High Town. presented in her book. "tertK IS, P o rt Of Hiii te S "

~ T K 0 MCllL Q/lSoM cuj 2£(qi& > PICKC K O F T H E DAY' J r ^ s M R M i E A R LY rounds of the battl« against apartheid er« graphically dramatised In Death Is Part Of The Process (BBCl, t.S). Set In 1960s' South Africa, 11 follows • ' multi-racial dissident group who. move from peaceful protest to a campaign of sabotage. This taut/ exciting two-pa rter Is adapted by Alan Plater from the novel by Hilda Bernstein — herself one such campaigner until she and her husband had to flee the country. Witt* Art MaHk, John Matshlkiza^ Moira Downie (right) and Jack Klaff; Part 2 next Sunday.

"\W l ~ b c u KA a JY O C b - l Q - gfc? IN MY VIEW by Hilary Kingsley

YOU’D go a long way to find a script and the committed, low-^ arrests-’and increasingly .brutal- tor­ ★ play title less enticing than acting. ture in.-jaih'* ~ : • - - Death Is Part Of The Process. There was no shilly-shallying in A rt Malik., as- emotional lawyer the message, either. Indress was^ jailed; beaten but es­ B ut you’d go a longer way to find- caped. Solemn Thabo, played with a deadly serious subject made more We’d met the mixed group of. immense force by. John M atshikiza frrippingly exciting than this two people who’d decided sabotage was was betrayed; horribly, tortured and part BBC-1, drama about South therr only weapon against the' died/ much to the annoyance o f the Africa in the sixties. . Apartheid regime. ... . ~ ‘ sneering policemen. Like The Monocled Mutineer this Last night the pace quickened 'Things endedonTa defiant tiofeTI was fiction based on fact. Also like after'-the white university lecturer w anted to know more, w hat hap- looked and felt right in every was caught. Increasingly daring ex­ pen

&Vru\da.rd s- to ■ • 9^-iojss ' •• : Death is Part or the Process. Second half of AJan Plater's atmospheric drama, adapted novel by . Hilda Bernstein, of anti-I apartheid protest in. 1961 South Africa. j Having; turned from, non-violent cam- i dynamite and . detonator, fee dissidents soon have the Special Branch reach­ ing: for their collar*: the: horrific brutality o t the interrogation- scenes: vividajr illustrate the reason for the axiom sharedr’by police and protestors alike : " T hey, a ll taHc” r - t W [ l-ae film's style Is ofteii‘reminiscent o f a Jues',..?lovi£ S^outf the-wartime-..Resistance and^ although-- the flnal-soene dragjrthe mood; t h e 1961 s e ttin g s

^UAdCtXj [\MSo S-lO-Zb .

9.05 Death Is Partof the Process.* Second part of excellent Alan Plater adaptation of Hilda Bernstein’s novel of South Africa in the 60s [ 'TIa

I --- 9 5 DEATH IS PART OF THE PROCESS: 2. Second half of the well-craftad political thriller set in the South Africa of the sixties and adapted by Alao Plater from Hilda Bernstein’s novel, with Art Malik as anti-apartheid activist Indres, desperately trying to warn the members of the group still free that they have a traitor in their minds. Ceefax sub-titles. PERFORMANCE by Ann McFerran and Sarah Dunant

"W e tried not to dwell on such scenes," says adaptor Alan Plater, "but everyone got very low and depressed during the interrogation scenes." Death is Part of the Process w ill be broadcast on BBC 1 on September 28 and October 5. NUCLEAR FRICTION "I FEEL as if I've been married to Sir john [M ills] fo r 5 0 years," says Rosemary Harris. She hasn't, of course, ever been married to the famous actor/knight but such is the power and intensity of Brian Clark's two-hander, The Petition, that both actors feel intimately involved. Directed by that other famous — and of late, infamous — knight, Sir Peter Hall, The Petition was the sell-out success of Rita Tushingham in Judgement in Stone: a psychological chiller based on a Ruth Rendell novel Broadway last winter, and has just trans­ ferred from its run at the National THE EYES STILL may rival Granada's Indian saga for Theatre to the West End. The petition both impact and popularity. has been signed by Elizabeth (Rose­ HAVE IT The BBC's production of Hilda Bern­ mary Harris) who, to the horror of her REMEMBER the face above? Twenty stein's Death is Part o f the Process, the more reactionary husband (Sir John years ago that crooked nose and those story of the emergent revolutionaries in Mills), reveals herself to be a closet anti- wide, haunting eyes made hers one of South Africa, could not be more timely. nuclear campaigner. But in their ensuing the most distinctive countenances of the It is appropriate that Malik should row, the real issue at stake is not the 60s. Well, tw o decades on, Rita Tush­ find such a role in Alan Plater's superb state of the world but of their marriage, ingham may have grown up, but the adaptation of this prize-winning politi­ and the crux of the drama concerns the eyes are still the same. Best known fo r cal thriller, based largely on the author's painful revelations and intimate self­ films like A Taste of Honey and The own experiences in South Africa of the scrutiny of these two septuagenarians. Knack, Rita now lives on Canada with early 60s when her husband was impri­ "Elizabeth is a seemingly open person," her film director husband and tw o child­ soned with Nelson Mandela. Malik says Rosemary Harris, "but actually ren, but she is back in London this month plays Indres, a young Indian student, she's very secretive, while he appears fo r a tribute to her at the National Film training to be a lawyer who is so euphemistic, but actually he's quite Theatre, and to launch her latest movie, affected by the iniquities of that brutal straightforward." Happily married to Judgement in Stone. Based on a Ruth regime that he drops out to join a mixed novelist John Ehle fo r 20 years, Rose­ Rendell novel, it's a psychological chiller group of dissident activists. mary says that even if, like her, you in which Tushingham plays an illiterate "Like Harry Kumar [in Jewel] Indres is hate marital confrontations, "every (and by the sound of it psychotic) older a loner," explains Malik, (who like his married couple will find lines that strike woman who becomes involved with a Jewel persona, came to this country home, and anyone w ho has exper- J religious maniac and . . . well, I don't from Pakistan to be educated when he ienced guilt or nursed remorse will 1 want to give too much away. was very young). "But unlike Harry, identify with Elizabeth." "It was a difficult part for me to play. Indres becomes politically involved. He The Petition opens at Wyndhams I There is almost no dialogue and yet you reaches the point in his life when he can­ Theatre, London, on October 6th. have to suggest the turmoil going on not give in to the sentimentality of inside. It meant that I had to make it a merely being involved in university poli­ OUTBACK IN very physical performance. Very tics — and I sympathise with that. It's so intense." Intensity, of course, used to easy to be a political radical at univers­ ANGER be one o f the trademarks o f Rita Tush- ity; I remember how as a student in the FAMILY strife is also one o f the themes ingham's screen personality. Yet in real early 70s we used to march against of Bruce Beresford's latest movie, The life she comes over as disarmingly Margaret Thatcher milk-snatcher. All Fringe Dwellers. Set in Australia, and relaxed and normal. "I suppose that was quite easy but to actually do anyth­ covering similar territory to Keri Hulme's just what the camera saw in me. M aybe ing . . award-winning The Bone People, the it was my youth. Certainly as I've got For each of Bernstein's protagonists, Fringe Dwellers of the title are abori­ older the plum parts have got fewer. But whether it is the intellectual Indres, or gines, Australia's second-class citizens, then I think that's been a problem for a the streetwise black activist Thabo, the caught between the culture they have lot of actresses of my age.The parts sim­ consequences o f such active involve­ lost and the WASP society that doesn't ply aren't there." But with one film out ment may well be capture and torture. want them. Charting the story of one and another on the way it seems likely family's attempt to integrate and in par­ w e'll be seeing a lot more o f those eyes. ticular the struggle of the teenage Judgement in Stone opens in London daughter to get out of the settlement at the end of October. and forge a life of her own, the film manages to be both affectionate and PASSAGE FROM critical. And it's not afraid to expose the vicious spiral of alcohol and violence which so often plagues the dispos­ thinking woman's matinee idol, Art sessed. Shot in south Queensland just a who shot to stardom in Jew el in couple of miles from the Cherbourg Crown, returns to the small screen Aboriginal reserve (from where the film month in a two-part serial which drew much o f its cast), and sporting two

Art Malik as Indres in Death is P art of the Process: "It's so easy to be a radical at university* d. -&M. \L,S With the Compliments

. 0 o f the

British Broadcasting Corporation

Collection Number: A3299 Collection Name: Hilda and Rusty BERNSTEIN Papers, 1931-2006

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Publisher: Historical Papers Research Archive Collection Funder: Bernstein family Location: Johannesburg ©2015

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This document is part of the Hilda and Rusty Bernstein Papers, held at the Historical Papers Research Archive, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa.