WILL STONE fact-checks the colourful life of Ozzy Osbourne
Know thy enemy
Peter Hain knew well apartheid's vulnerabilities and used this knowledge to seriously undermine the regime’s international reputation
Hitting where it hurts
[Wikipedia] 
JAMES CROSSLEY applauds a lucid biography of the German radical preacher who reemerged as a hero in the GDR
Prizes all round: the Bard hands plaudits to the Miners Gala, OT&JC, Joe Solo, Black Sabbath’s frontman and the Lionesses
Star cartoonist JAMIE BRITTON is in awe of a graphic novel of epic proportions that explores class, religion and globalisation via the strange cultivation of Ginseng in the US Midwest
GUILLERMO THOMAS is intrigued by a history of the Middle East that demonstrates how promising post colonial beginnings were snuffed out by Western imperialist interests
MARIA DUARTE recommends the intricate study of a high-performance and highly dysfuntional German family
A Pretoria Boy - The Story of South Africa’s “Public Enemy Number One”
by Peter Hain
Icon Books £20
MY relationship with Peter began in our shared struggle against apartheid. It continues in Action for Southern Africa (ACTSA), the successor to the Anti-Apartheid Movement of which he is Honorary Vice-President.
Hain’s latest biography begins with his childhood introduction to the methods of the Apartheid Special Branch as they pursued his activist parents. He describes his emotions at their imprisonment; among the first detainees without trial under the 12-day detention laws.
Peter’s parents were members of the Liberal Party and a friend, John Harris, joined the “Liberal” Armed Resistance Movement which bombed Johannesburg Central Station. Harris was sentenced to death and shortly after his execution in 1964 the Hains left South Africa for the UK.
More from this author
BOB NEWLAND, a former London Recruit, recommends the extraordinary memoir of struggle veteran Kingsley Mamobolo
BOB NEWLAND relishes a fascinating read as well as an invaluable piece of local research
BOB NEWLAND welcomes a clear-eyed account that counts the human cost of the Irish Republican struggle for both sides
BOB NEWLAND admires the tactics of a punchy exhibition that advocates awareness of Third World debt its neocolonial injustice
