Book Review (Non-fiction) Born A Crime

BORN A CRIME

Stories From A South African Childhood

Trevor Noah

John Murray 2016       288 Pages

“Racism is a problem everywhere else in the world, in South Africa it is the law”.

Under that law (now happily defunct) the birth of comedian Trevor Noah to a black Xhosa woman and white Swiss father was nothing less than a crime; an act punishable by a five-year prison sentence. But people being people, and the pull of individual personal attraction being too strong, even the stringent enforcement of Apartheid failed to prevent widespread race-mixing.

This is something our caste panchayats, moral police and anti-“love jihad” activists should also seriously consider. Despite the best efforts of these sundry worthies, inter-religious, inter-regional and inter-caste marriages DO take place. And that’s besides the many Indians with spouses who are foreign nationals...

The best way to puncture the absurdities of this essentially untenable stand against consenting adults forming unions of their own choice is by using humour. Luckily, Noah, currently anchor and host of The Daily Show on Comedy Central, is professionally well capable of doing so. However, the humour he employs is of the wryly ironic and sardonically witty kind; not laugh-out-aloud slapstick.

Born a Crime provides an  anecdotal first-hand account of the last days of Apartheid and its aftermath, and what it was like to grow up in South Africa as a mixed-race child, when one wasn't white enough to be considered white, nor black enough to be considered black. This is the engaging story of a mischievous young boy who grows into a restless young man as he struggles to find himself in a world where he was never supposed to exist.

It is also the story of Noah’s close relationship with his fearless, rebellious, and fervently religious mother. Sometimes brutally emotional, his tales of a South African childhood weave together a moving and funny account of making a way through a damaged world in a dangerous time, armed only with a keen sense of humour and a mother's unconventional, unconditional love.