Bless Also the Youth
A novel by Barbara Borst
Sandile Malindi refuses to join the student strikes that convulse South Africa in the final years under the racist apartheid government. A proud son of Soweto merchants, he is determined to continue his education at a private high school. Peter Seibert, an American who has just arrived, knows little about the country’s politics and inadvertently touches sore points when he first encounters Sandile at school. But he earns Sandile’s trust, starting on the sports field. Kagiso Mafolo, a Soweto student organizer, meets them when she visits her aunt, a maid at the Seiberts’ home. She calls Sandile a sell-out for failing to back the freedom struggle but later faces her own problems over politics. Rising above the conflicts of race, wealth and ideology that initially divide them, the three build friendships, discover love, confront serious challenges and help each other survive in tumultuous times.
Photo by Barbara Borst, Soweto, 1989
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