Henning Mankell: I Die, But My Memory Lives On

Most of us might know Henning Mankell for his Wallander crime novels but he has recently also published a non-fiction book on AIDS in Africa. The book is called I Die, but My Memory Lives on: The World AIDS Crisis and the Memory Book Project.

Mankell who spent a substantial amount of his life in Africa, has with the Memory Book Project provided an opportunity to those dying of AIDS to create a record of their lives in words and pictures for the children they leave behind.

…In Uganda, Mankell finds village after village populated only by children and the elderly—those left behind after AIDS swept away an entire generation. These slim, intensely personal volumes can contain words, pictures, a pressed butterfly, or even grains of sand as ways to represent the lives lost to this devastating plague. Excerpts from Ugandan memory books appear throughout I Die, But My Memory Lives On and, together with Mankell’s narrative, they tell stories of individual lives while sounding a powerful warning about the threat of AIDS…

The book is featuring a foreword by Archbishop Desmond Tutu. A portion of the book’s proceeds are donated to AIDS charities in Africa.

More information on the book and some recent interviews with Henning Mankell on the topic:

• Lofty Talk and Empty Promises
• Henning Mankell’s New Non-Fiction Book Sheds Light on the AIDS Crisis in Africa
• The shame is on us all
• Book review at the NewPress website.
• Henning Mankell’s personal web site