Jonny Steinberg Explained

Jonny Steinberg
Birth Date:22 March 1970
Birth Place:South Africa
Education:Wits University
Alma Mater:University of Oxford
Notableworks:Winnie & Nelson: Portrait of a Marriage (2023)
Awards:National Book Critics Circle Award for Biography
Windham–Campbell Literature Prize

Sunday Times Alan Paton Award;
Media24 Books Literary Prize: Recht Malan Prize for Nonfiction

Jonny Steinberg (born 22 March 1970) is a South African writer and scholar.

Biography

Steinberg was born and raised in the northern suburbs of Johannesburg, South Africa. He was educated at Wits University in Johannesburg, and at the University of Oxford, where he was a Rhodes Scholar and earned a doctorate in political theory. He taught for nine years at Oxford, where he was Professor of African Studies. He currently teaches at Yale University's Council on African Studies.[1]

Books

Steinberg's first two books – Midlands (2002), about the murder of a white South African farmer, and The Number (2004), a biography of a prison gangster – won South Africa's premier non-fiction award, the Sunday Times Alan Paton Award. In 2013, Steinberg was an inaugural winner of the Windham–Campbell Literature Prizes.[2]

His books also include Three-Letter Plague (published as Sizwe's Test in the United States), which chronicles a young man's journey through South Africa's AIDS pandemic. It was a Washington Post Book of the Year[3] and was shortlisted for the Wellcome Trust Book Prize.[4] Steinberg is also the author of Thin Blue (2008), an exploration of the unwritten rules of engagement between South African civilians and police,[5] and Little Liberia: An African Odyssey in New York (2011), about the Liberian civil war and its aftermath in an exile community in New York. Writing in The Guardian, Margaret Busby described it as an "extraordinary, stylistically varied mix of reportage, history and biography".[6]

Steinberg's 2015 book, A Man of Good Hope, was described by Observer reviewer Ian Birrell as "an epic African saga that chronicles some fundamental modern issues such as crime, human trafficking, migration, poverty and xenophobia, while giving glimpses into the Somali clan system, repression in Ethiopia and lethal racism in townships".[7] The book was adapted into a stage production by the Isango Ensemble and premiered at the Young Vic in London in 2016.[8]

Steinberg's dual biography of Winnie Madikizela and Nelson Mandela, Winnie & Nelson: Portrait of a Marriage, was published in May 2023. Damon Galgut described it as "a devastating study of modern South Africa", while Hlonipha Mokoena named it "a masterful book that rattles your bones".[9] [10] Richard Stengel, ghostwriter of Nelson Mandela’s autobiography, called it "a beautiful and immensely sad book. [...] [Steinberg] gently but firmly removes the masks [Winnie and Nelson] each carefully constructed, only to find other masks underneath."[11] J. M. Coetzee described the book "as deeply sympathetic to Winnie, caught up in the whirlwind of insurrectionary violence, as to Nelson, trapped in his prison cell and losing touch day by day with the evolving situation on the ground".[12] It won the National Book Critics Circle Award for biography[13] and was shortlisted for the LA Times Book Prize for biography.[14] It was a Washington Post, New Yorker, Guardian, Times of London, Times Literary Supplement, Spectator and Waterstones Book of the Year.[15] [16] [17] [18] [19] [20]

Awards and honours

Bibliography

External links

Notes and References

  1. Web site: Jonny Steinberg The MacMillan Center Council on African Studies . 2024-02-16 . african.macmillan.yale.edu . en.
  2. Web site: Jonny Steinberg . 2024-02-16 . Windham Campbell Prizes . en.
  3. News: 2011-02-17 . Holiday Guide 2008: Gifts - Best Books of 2008 (washingtonpost.com) . . 2024-02-16 . https://web.archive.org/web/20110217204745/http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/artsandliving/features/2008/holiday-guide/gifts/best-books-of-2008/index.html . 17 February 2011 .
  4. 2009-11-05 . 'Keeper' by Andrea Gillies wins first ever Wellcome Trust Book Prize . 2024-02-16 . Wellcome . en.
  5. Bosworth, Mary; Hoyle, Carolyn (2012). What is Criminology?. OUP Oxford. pp. 130–131. ISBN 9780191635410
  6. News: Busby . Margaret . 2011-03-12 . Little Liberia: An African Odyssey in New York City by Jonny Steinberg – review . 2024-02-16 . The Guardian . en-GB . 0261-3077.
  7. News: Birrell . Ian . 2015-01-04 . A Man of Good Hope review – a refugee's tale . 2024-02-16 . The Observer . en-GB . 0029-7712.
  8. Web site: 2019-04-16 . A Man of Good Hope . 2024-02-16 . Young Vic website . en.
  9. Web site: The TLS Books of the Year 2023: Our contributors decide . 2024-02-16 . TLS . en-GB.
  10. Mokoena . Hlonipha . REVIEW Love turning like quicksilver: Jonny Steinberg's Winnie & Nelson . 13 June 2023. 2024-02-16 . Life . en-US.
  11. News: Stengel . Richard . 2023-05-14 . Winnie & Nelson by Jonny Steinberg; The Plot to Save South Africa by Justice Malala – review . 2024-02-16 . The Guardian . en-GB . 0261-3077.
  12. Book: Steinberg, Jonny . Winnie & Nelson: Portrait of a Marriage . 2023-05-11 . William Collins . 978-0-00-835378-0 . English.
  13. https://www.bookcritics.org/awards/ 2023 NBCC Award Winners
  14. News: Raja Shehadeh, Yiyun Li and Maria Bamford among L.A. Times Book Prize finalists. Los Angeles Times. Jessica . Gelt. 21 February 2024.
  15. News: 50 notable books of nonficrion. Washington Post.
  16. 2023-01-25 . The Best Books of 2023 . 2024-02-16 . The New Yorker . en-US.
  17. News: Sturges . Fiona . 2023-12-07 . The best memoirs and biographies of 2023 . 2024-02-16 . The Guardian . en-GB . 0261-3077.
  18. Web site: The TLS Books of the Year 2023: Our contributors decide . 2024-02-16 . TLS . en-GB.
  19. Web site: 2023-11-08 . Books of the year II: more choices of reading in 2023 . 2024-02-16 . The Spectator . en-US.
  20. https://www.waterstones.com/blog/the-best-books-of-2023-biography#biography Waterstones
  21. https://www.goodreads.com/award/show/9050-alan-paton-award "Alan Paton Award Winners"
  22. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunday_Times_CNA_Literary_Awards#:~:text=Originally%20established%20in%201989%2C%20the,meritorious%20works%20of%20non%2Dfiction
  23. [Sunday Times CNA Literary Awards]
  24. Web site: Yale awards $1.35 million to nine writers . YaleNews . Dorie . Baker . March 4, 2013 . March 5, 2013.
  25. Web site: 2020-06-18 . 2020 Media24 Books Literary Prize: Recht Malan Prize for Nonfiction - LitNet . 2024-02-16 . LitNet - Die boekehuis met baie wonings.
  26. Web site: April 1, 2024 . Jonny Steinberg Wins 2023 National Book Critics Circle Award for ‘Winnie & Nelson: A Portrait of a Marriage’ . April 10, 2024. macmillan.yale.edu . en-US.

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