A Human Being Died That Night

Publishers Weekly

One of the 19 members of South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission, psychologist Gobodo-Madikizela weaves together gripping stories from apartheid's victims and perpetrators. Most compelling are the stories behind her prison interviews with Eugene de Kock, known as "Prime Evil," for leading apartheid's death squads. Equating these encounters to a real-life version of Silence of the Lambs, Gobodo-Madikizela, much like her fictional counterpart Clarice, runs a gamut of emotions from anger to empathy as she deconstructs the mind of this insidious yet tortured soul. Although Gobodo-Madikizela provides a superficial background of de Kock, the captivating honesty of her inner struggle to transcend the hateful emotions attached to the apartheid regime is compensation for the book's lack of historical data. This is a refreshingly psychological study into society's ability to cope in the wake of great tragedy. An entire chapter is devoted to the mental repercussions of Gobodo-Madikizela's knee-jerk reaction to touching de Kock's hand as a sympathetic response to his sorrowful regrets. Upon learning from de Kock that she had touched his "trigger hand" she notes her confusion about having embraced the hand that killed so many. Gobodo-Madikizela cautiously notes that some countries might not be ready for the type of truth commission instituted in South Africa but wisely suggests that all societies should seek an alternative to retributive justice because "to dismiss perpetrators simply as evildoers and monsters shuts the door to the kind of dialogue that leads to an enduring peace " (Jan. 23) Copyright 2003 Cahners Business Information.

Foreign Affairs

Amid the growing literature on South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission, this book stands out for its articulate attempt to explain in layman's terms how the trc furthered the psychological process of national reconciliation through individual expressions of remorse and forgiveness. The author, a professional psychologist, was a member of the trc and also conducted dozens of hours of interviews with Eugene de Kock, one of the apartheid state's most notorious killers. If yesterday's victims are not to become tomorrow's oppressors, Gobodo-Madikizela argues, societies that have been through mass atrocities need a public process of defining and acknowledging moral responsibility and constructing, through language, symbols, and stories, a new sense of collective self-worth that can permeate public discussion of the past. A judicial process based on retributive justice alone does not suffice, she says, because it cannot adequately attribute blame to broader ideological and political forces, which created the social conditions conducive to the crimes committed.

Library Journal

Are great acts of violence always met with vengeance? No, claims Gobodo-Madikizela, clinical psychologist, along with Desmond Tutu, a member of the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC). When former apartheid arch-assassin Eugene de Kock was arrested, tried, and sentenced to serve two lifetimes plus, the author had the opportunity to interview him several times, both during the TRC and as a prisoner. A talented author, Gobodo-Madikizela paints chilling scenes of total brutality while relaying de Kock's matter-of-fact account of the murderous raids against anti-apartheid forces in neighboring Namibia deemed necessary by higher-ups in the government. Even more interesting is the examination of forgiveness, remorse, apology, and what it means to be evil. Gobodo-Madikizela was brought to the brink of emotional collapse during the TRC and is clearly empathetic toward the victims and survivors, but he also asks difficult questions concerning the state of humanity. A short, disturbing, well-written book that should find a strong readership of recent South African history and the effects of apartheid.-James Thorsen, Central North Carolina Regional Lib. Syst., Burlington Copyright 2003 Cahners Business Information.

Kirkus Reviews

Interviews with a vampire: a black South African psychologist explores the mind of one of the apartheid regime’s most notorious enforcers.

Is it possible to forgive a monster, to reabsorb a Milosevic, a Hitler, a Stalin into society? Though she works in a reference to Hannibal Lecter early on, Gobodo-Madikizela is judicious in her characterizations of the now imprisoned policeman Eugene de Kock, "the man whom many in the country [of South Africa] considered the most brutal of apartheid’s covert police operatives"--and who has long and deservedly borne the nickname "Prime Evil." As a psychologist who spent many sessions talking with him about his crimes, she finds reason to think him psychotic, but also brutalized by the very regime in whose service he had done so much of that evil. As a citizen, she finds his existence and methods to be part and parcel of a regime that for generations had committed itself to upholding white supremacy at whatever cost--and that publicly disavowed the excesses perpetrated in its name. (That regime was also masterful at altering the historical report card, she writes; the police report on a massacre of some 500 black South African protestors in 1976 acknowledges only one victim.) Hung out to dry but still loyal to his masters, de Kock reveals the process of denial attendant in being a criminal with a badge, for, Gobodo-Madikizela writes, "like sin, crime that is a gross violation of human rights almost always hides its true nature from its own self." Gobodo-Madikizela’s purpose in this gracefully written account is less to condemn than to document, understand, and ultimately forgive; without a hint of sanctimony, she argues that a victim who puts revengeaside can gain a more satisfying measure of power by becoming "the gatekeeper to what the outcast desires--readmission into the human community." Though the process may not yield complete reconciliation, she asserts, finding and exercising that power is both therapeutic and necessary for building democracy.

There’s much forgiving to be done in this world, and this primer in compassion makes a fine start.