White Boy Running

Front Cover
Pan Macmillan, 2004 - Biography & Autobiography - 272 pages

In 1987, after a twelve year absence, Chistopher Hope returned to South Africa to report on the run up to that year's whites-only election. The nature of the election campaign and the bitter defeat of the liberals lead him to write this satirical, evocative portrait of what it looked and felt like growing up in a country gripped by an absurd, racist insanity. Full of exquisite and despairing descriptions of the landscape the White Boy is running through, this mordantly witty account of escape, displacement and disolusionment is a mordern classic of journalistic memoir.

'beautifully written' - The Times

'mocking, angry and beautiful' - Washington Post

'exactly the right note of cold, poetic irony' - Financial Times

'exquisite and despairing' - Newsday

'An exceptional book' - Los Angeles Times

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About the author (2004)

Christopher Hope was born in Johannesburg, South Africa in 1944. He is the author of twelve novels including Kruger’s Alp, winner of the Whitbread Novel Award, and the Booker short-listed Serenity House. Hope’s non-fiction includes a travel book, Moscow! Moscow!, which won a PEN Award and most recently Brothers Under The Skin a reflection on the nature of tyranny. He lives in France.

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