[PEN-L:27269] Obituary: author of ANC Freedom Charter

[Chris Burford <cburford@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Well informed obituary in the Times of Rusty Bernstein. Illuminates issues 
of stages of struggle, legal and illegal work, and the relationship of 
vanguard and masses.

> Rusty Bernstein Exiled South African Communist who drafted the ANC's key 
> document, the Freedom Charter
>
>
> Lionel ?Rusty? Bernstein was one of the most distinguished members of the 
> small group of (mainly Jewish) white South African Communists who played a 
> decisive role in shaping the African National Congress. Although it was 
> never politic to say so ? the public version was that it had been put 
> together from thousands of write-in submissions from Africans ? he was 
> largely responsible for drafting the Freedom Charter, the ANC?s bible for 
> fifty years. Many have also seen his hand in Mandela?s famous ?No Easy 
> Walk To Freedom? speech from the dock, for Bernstein was a talented 
> writer, unselfish in his efforts to help others and never one to seek 
> glory or the limelight.
>
> Born into a well-to-do Jewish family in Durban, he was orphaned at the age 
> of 12 and farmed out, together with his three siblings, to whichever aunts 
> and uncles would take them. This hardship was considerably sharpened by 
> his being sent to board at Hilton College, a private school rigorously run 
> on the muscular Christian lines then in favour with the English public 
> schools it aped. Although Bernstein excelled academically there, he hated 
> its ethos and, through the influence of a sympathetic Latin teacher, had 
> become a keen Communist by his late teens, meeting his future wife, Hilda, 
> in the Communist Party of South Africa (CPSA).


rest recommended:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,60-339093,00.html

Chris Burford