The anti-apartheid activist kept spirits up in prison — and knew how to work the system
Denis Goldberg in London, where he was presented with the Freedom of the City of London award, January 27 2016. Picture: BEN STANSALL / AFP
Contact with his family was limited — initially, one censored 500-word letter and one visit every six months, though these were gradually increased. But Denis’s first wife, Esme, was in the UK, so opportunities to visit were practically eliminated. All newspapers were banned until the 1980s. Correspondence with friends and comrades had to be specifically allowed and was generally refused.During his sentence, Denis suffered ill-health, which presented a challenge to keeping up his spirits.
He was our negotiator with the “boers” . What may not be widely known is that even though prisoners were entitled to certain rights, called “privileges” by the authorities, these were often withheld and prisoners had to struggle to get them back or have them at all. We were left alone to clean the section, a time some of us devoted to political reading groups. We told the boers that one does not polish Marley tiles, and we never did. This space we won was the result of years of struggle, by earlier prisoners, led by Denis. The boers had the power, but we had a capacity for “drama” that they did not relish.
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