Summary

Mandela opens “Birth of a Freedom Fighter” with an acknowledgment that he is unable to pinpoint precisely one moment in which he became political. He instead suggests that his politicization was the “steady accumulation of a thousand slights, a thousand indignities, a thousand unremembered moments,” all of which produced in him a “desire to fight the system that imprisoned my people” (95). The world is changing in the 1940s, with the creation of the Atlantic Charter in 1941 and the subsequent response of the ANC called African Claims.

Spending time at Walter’s house, Mandela gets to know other liberation fighters, such as Anton Lembede, and Peter Mda. Together, they and others make plans for a Youth League, as part of the ANC. Dr. Xuma initially rejects their proposal, but finally in 1944 the Youth League is created. The League, according...