For a country with such a low proportion of its population reading regularly, South Africa generates a huge amount of literature, particularly about subjects the literate feel guilty about - namely, politics and history. Almost all the books we've listed are in print, and those that are not, and which are published in either the UK or US, should be fairly easy to track down in secondhand bookshops. Those books only published in South Africa may prove hard to find outside South Africa itself. Where two publishers are given, the first is British, the second US unless otherwise indicated. Titles marked * are particularly recommended
History and anthropology
William Beinart 20th Century South Africa (OUP, UK). A useful and concise account of South African history, with an emphasis on economic history that manages to emphasize the essential without descending into tedium. His predictions for...
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Autobiography and biography
Breyten Breytenbach True Confessions of an Albino Terrorist (Faber & Faber, UK). In vividly poetic language, the exiled Afrikaner poet tells the entertaining story of his return to South Africa in 1975 - to be arrested and jailed for...
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Travel
Gavin Bell Somewhere Over the Rainbow (Abacus, UK). A British foreign correspondent during the apartheid years returns in the mid-1990s to provide an astute commentary on the fortunes and foibles of the new South Africa. Dan...
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Fiction
Tatamkhulu Afrika The Innocents (Africasouth, SA) Set in the struggle years, this novel examines the moral and ethical issues of the time from a Muslim perspective. Mark Behr The Smell of Apples (Abacus,...
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Poetry
Guy Butler (ed) A Book of South African Verse (OUP, UK); Jack Cope and Uys Krige (eds) The Penguin Book of South African Verse (Penguin, UK). Early anthologies that, for better or for worse, "mapped"...
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The arts
Marion Arnold Women and Art in South Africa (David Philip, SA). Pioneering work that reinterprets South African art history. Basil Beakey Beyond the Blues: Township Jazz of the Sixties and Seventies (David...
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Specialist guidebooks
G.M. Branch Two Oceans (David Philip, SA). Don't be fooled by the coffee-table format; this is a comprehensive guide to southern Africa's marine life. David Bristow Best Hikes in Southern Africa (Struik,...
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Wine
David Biggs South African Plonk Buyer's Guide (Ampersand, SA). Annually updated survey of the best of the cheap wines (under R20).
James Seely The Wines of South Africa (Faber & Faber, UK). Almost as definitive as it claims, this book tackles South African wine region by region, estate by estate, complete with tasting notes and recommendations. Written by an author who once imported wine to the UK for Harvey's, but now does so for himself, it's a useful and inexpensive reference guide.
Philip van Zyl (ed) John Platter South African Wines (Andrew Mcdowall, SA). Annually updated pocket guide to South Africa's current output, with reviews and rating by one of the country's top wine writers.
