https://archive.org/details/southafricantra00pato
South African tragedy; the life and times of Jan Hofmeyr Hardcover – January 1, 1965
by Alan PATON (Author)
4.8 4.8 out of 5 stars 6 ratings
Language
English
Publisher
Charles Scribner's Sons
Publication date
January 1, 1965
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By The Numbers
5.0 out of 5 stars An Incredible Story Beautifully WrittenReviewed in the United States on December 31, 2013
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I knew Alan Paton very well when I lived in Durban in the 1980s. He told me that "Hofmeyr," this book's title in the version printed in South Africa and his only biography, was his "best." Jan Hendrik Hofmeyr was Paton's personal friend. Arguably the most brilliant person in South Africa's history, Hofmeyr was decent, moderate and deeply religious in the best sense of the word. He ultimately went into politics and was viewed as the natural successor to Prime Minister Jan Smuts.
Hoffmeyr died tragically when he was only 54. The reader will need to have a box of tissues nearby when reading this wonderfully written and deeply moving book.
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Johnny
5.0 out of 5 stars A Wonderful Book on SA HistoryReviewed in the United States on July 23, 2018
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A great book on one of the most important leaders in South Africa by one of South Africa's most important authors. What a disgrace Jan didn't become the leader of the Country, South Africa under him would have been today a much better place. Wonderful book indeed, enjoy it if you can!
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td
5.0 out of 5 stars Great bookReviewed in the United States on May 21, 2019
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Very informative and thorough.
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NYT
Jan Hol,nnye. c. 1945.
for neutrality, and, as Minister of Finance, became "the brain and power behind the South African war machine."
Hofmeyr's genius, his "prodi¬gious ability to make order out of any material presented to him." made him a superb ad-ministrator; but in scasitisre areas of personal and social relations he groped his way painfully and uncertainly. One theme recurs in this book like a refrain: "Hofmeyr was a white South African with white South African fears and preju¬dices and irrationalities - feeling his way out of the bog Into which he had been born." In 1936 he had reached firm ground when he risked an open break with his Cabinet col-leagues by attacking important government legislation as an abuse of white power. From then on the champions of white supremacy identified him as their chief antagonist. Their successful election campaign in 1948 was concentrated on "the danger of Hofmeyr."
THE drama of Bofnieyrs struggle to emancipate his mind from white South African atti¬tudes Is interwoven with the drama of his struggle to wean himself from his mother's pos¬sessive love. The spirit of Mrs, t-Iof.ocya brn.od; Cr UsIa book as over his life: caring for him, jealous beyond mason of his "Infinitesimal sollies" toward other women, bound to him in a relationship that Smuts called "a kind of marriage."
This American edition re-duces the total bulk of Paton's "Hofmeyr" by about one-fifth, chiefly by summarizing some passages of apparently local South African interest, and by combining the many brief units of the original into 16 chapters uninspiringly titled from "The Early Years" to "The End of the Road." These changes may enhance the book as a lststorl-cal survey, but they detract something from the artistic ef-fectiveness of the biography. For it Is as biography that this book must be ultimately Judged. and it is entirely possible that Paton's life of Hofmeyr will be shelved among classic biogra¬phies.
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