Last night I attended a performance of The Magic Flute at the ENO, and sometime in the middle, while Mozart's music proclaimed the progress of humanity from darkness into enlightenment, Nelson Mandela passed on in a bed thousands of miles away. I found out because my companion's Facebook newsfeed, checked upon leaving the building, was full of the tributes we'd all been waiting to give all year. This is how we learn of momentous things now. I think it's quite nice.
We walked to Trafalgar Square to see if anyone was gathering at South Africa House, and sure enough, there was a group of people clustered around in the bitter December cold outside the gates. A nascent shrine was growing, only a few flowers and a photo so far. No one knew what they were doing there, just that they wanted to stand in silence with some other people somewhere significant. They had formed a semicircle, and a couple of South African ladies were tirelessly singing old standards from the resistance days. I wished I could have joined in, but in my time in South Africa I only managed to learn Shosholoza and Nkosi Sikelel iAfrika, and these words were unfamiliar to me. A couple of white people nearby were singing under their breath. These were joyful songs of celebration, not mourning, and Mandela's name was frequently interwoven, shouted as a gleeful cry at the stars to mark his passing. Eventually, the beat the women were tapping out was taken up by the other bystanders, and we started stamping, a modest little contribution from a bunch of freezing, stoic Englishmen as a mark of respect.
I cried, not to my surprise. I felt very lucky to have heard that snatch of sung Xhosa (or was it Zulu? I will never know), just enough to make it concrete. I have visited the famous prison cell, lived amongst South Africans, have family who even served in his cabinet. I knew that when the moment came I would want to cry, but was afraid that it would all be too distant. The shouts of defiance, and the murmured memories of those who had come to Trafalgar Square many years ago to protest the apartheid regime, who had thought this the best place to be that night - these gave life to the moment, thank God. It was never really about Mandela for me, perhaps, rather that indefinable pang of sadness and admiration and that meek, unbearable flicker of hope that you get when faced with the image of a human, anywhere, who is weak and opposing the mighty. Mandela was merely the most famous such image remaining, and his passing is gutting not because he is a loss, but because the whole fact of his life is gutting to anyone paying attention, really.
I wish I could have something to add. This and Gary Younge sum up many of my thoughts: he was political and had edge to him, and that shouldn't be forgotten. A radical and not a revolutionary, well, that's what I'd like to be. Never giving in to the urge to overthrow and destroy, but never relenting in the fight against the powerful, always being a thorn in someone's side.
One thing does stick in my mind though. There's been plenty on Facebook today about how we shouldn't use this to score political points. Well, hopefully not, though we will absolutely point out hypocrisy, and the Left should absolutely be clear that they got the apartheid thing right where the Right got it wrong. That is essential to remembering the struggle. These are not political points, this is a matter of honesty. If Cameron was a good man, he would come out and say his mind has been changed, but he and the Tory Party weren't into Mandela at the time. As it is, weasel words must suffice.
The point is, if the Right is honest, it will never be that interested in injustice. That's not the point of the Right. When Cameron was my age, he went to Apartheid South Africa to meet politicians, paid for by an anti-sanctions lobbying group. Whatever else he thought, South Africa was not his primary concern in the world. That's fine. He did not see the world in terms of a struggle between the strong and the weak. Justice was not as important to him as order, tradition, stability, and the rest of it - that's the point of being conservative (Convenient for him that his own social class does really well out of those things, but hey).
The fact that someone like Mandela comes out of history rather well due to concern for justice is embarrassing to conservatism. Their continual hypocrisy reminds me I am probably on the right side. Justice, in the end, is much sexier.
Obama gave Mandela the subtle tribute that "now he belongs to the ages", the same words used by Edwin Stanton as Lincoln died in front of him. Like Lincoln, before long it will be impossible to imagine that you could have lived at the same time as Mandela and found him despicable or even a cause for indifference. Cameron and his crowd will have to live with that, as the cause of progress marches on into the distance, leaving them in its dusty wake.
Though in the grave the pilgrims find their resting,
Reward their virtue’s brave road,
And take them into your home.
No comments:
Post a Comment