Tuning in…
Tuning in…
Castaway
1 appearance
South African lawyer and anti-apartheid activist who, after imprisonment and a car bomb, became a constitutional judge and architect of post-apartheid governmen
On the island
Eight records
Symphony No. 9 in E minor, Op. 95, 'From the New World': II. Largo
New York Philharmonic, conducted by Leonard Bernstein
When I was in my solitary confinement, to keep up my courage, I used to pace up and down the tiny cell and I used to sing out loud and whistle. And one day I heard whistling coming back, and I whistled back and there was a connection. And I tried out all the songs of Struggle that I knew, and there was no response. So I knew it wasn't someone from my ANC Associated group. And the only tune that we could share was the Going Home theme from the New World Symphony. And to this day my skin prickles when I hear it.
Jazz, they were the poets of a new South Africa. They wrote a new constitution long before we got the text. They did it through their music. And the piece of music, Mannenberg, became almost a sort of unofficial anthem of South Africa.
Violin Concerto No. 1 in A minor, Op. 77: III. Passacaglia - IV. Burlesca
David Oistrakh, Czech Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Yevgeny Mravinsky
When I came into classical music, the greatest capacity of music to reach the human being, to speak almost in a human voice, was through the violin. And the piece I've chosen is David Oustrach playing the cadenza from the I think it's the third movement, and it leads into the fourth movement of Shostakovic's Violin Concerto.
Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong
It's Louis Armstrong and Ella Fitzgerald for sheer panache. serenity, ease in what's really quite a difficult song, and interest. I don't think you can beat them. And I spent many foggy days in in London town.
Piano Sonata No. 29 in B-flat major, Op. 106, 'Hammerklavier': III. Adagio sostenutoFavourite
The first time I really heard it. Was as I was recovering from the bomb, I went to Portugal. I had a wonderful friend there. Who just took me in and in London I'd been so correct... She shattered the whole thing. We would talk right through the night... and she played this music... And so it's beautiful music. It's recovering rediscovering my body.
Inti-Illimani with John Williams and Paco Peña
I think the two groups that received the most support internationally were the Chileans and the South Africans. And I was very moved by the way members of the English. Intelligentsia generally connected up with Chilean theatre people, arts people and music in particular. And John Williams linked up very easily and naturally with the a group Inti Ilimani.
It has to be in Cosi Sikaleli, Africa. It's a hymn that united believers and non believers, Africans, non Africans. And when I watch the beginnings of a rugby match and I see these big hulking forwards Trying to look as terrible as possible to intimidate the other side, singing in Cozi Siko Lady Africa, I'm just totally moved.
I'm I'm a late convert to opera and it was so hard choosing between Mozart Wagner and Puccini. But in the end I've gone for Puccini. And in the end for the opera that I know the least, Turandotte, I saw it once, and and this queen, she's magnificent, she's chopping off the heads of all these suitors. It's a kind of imperious feminism. a revenge for all the cruelty that's been done to women.
In conversation
Presenter asks
2:05How did the bomb that maimed you give you optimism?
The solitary confinement was terrible, and it was followed by torture, by sleep deprivation, the sense of humiliation, and that sense of other people can dictate to you. That's terrible. You never quite get over it.
Presenter asks
7:03What did they want out of you [during your 168 days of solitary confinement]?
I never found out exactly. It was detention without trial, no charge. But clearly I I was involved with underground activities against apartheid when everything was banned. And I'd cross-examined many of the police in political civil rights trials, so I wasn't popular with them.
Presenter asks
8:07Do you think [your interrogators] felt awkward because you were a white man?
They felt awkward in some ways, but also because I was. Learned, I was an advocate, I was a lawyer. and that made them a little bit uncomfortable. But on the other hand I think at times they had a special anger and hatred for me. Because I came from the same community. So in my case it wasn't just a case of oppressed people fighting back. It was a moral challenge. It was a choice. So I would be seen as a traitor.
The keepsakes
The book
Stendhal
It's a very poetical book. And it's an individual with a strong sensibility, puzzled by war and revolution and change. I read it and I identified so strongly with I think his name was Fabrice.
The luxury
Again, it came to me late in life. We repudiated anything that it wasn't that it made you sissy, but that somehow showed self-indulgence, and just the idea of perfume that serves no purpose at all other than just to make you feel good. and I would probably ration the little squirts, and when that's over I would search the island to find some pods or some blossoms or something, and see if I could make something that would just smell nice and make me feel all the associations with those luxuries that I repudiated for so long.
Presenter asks
8:46Two years later they took you again and you did crack. What was the difference?
Sleep deprivation. Eventually, after being kept awake all day and all night, I just collapsed onto the floor. They poured water on me, and I started talking. I held back quite a lot. But the mere fact that I said anything at all was a terrible defeat for me, and I've never recovered from that.
Presenter asks
25:05Why have you depoliticised yourself [from the ANC]?
When people come into court they must see a judge there defending the Constitution. They mustn't see, Oh, I'll be the ANC militant or so-and-so who belonged to this party or no party.
“We never lost the belief. It was a conviction. It wasn't based on rational evidence.”
“I was very worried at one stage when I was in prison. I couldn't hate the gods. I thought I'm a failed revolutionary. What's wrong with me? I should be angry, ready to rise up to kill. I never really felt that. I just saw people there doing jobs.”
“I'd never seen him, I'd never quarrelled with him, we weren't angry with each other, we hadn't fought over anything. He didn't know me, but he tried to kill me.”
“If I were offered my arm back, I probably wouldn't accept it. I'm so used to living as I am. And it took me a while to Not feel ugly.”