South Africa

The reissued album features the sound of the South African musician once known as Dollar Brand. Critic Kevin Whitehead says: "When Abdullah got a-rumbling, his piano was like a force of nature."

Penny Penny put down his broom and picked up a mic for his 1994 debut, now reissued.

Nadine Gordimer has always incorporated political themes into her novels, but her latest work turns its sights toward the domestic sphere. In No Time Like the Present, a South African activist couple struggles to find happiness in a world of their own making.

South African trumpeter and band leader Hugh Masakela has released more than 30 albums since his American debut in 1961. The concept behind his latest album, Jabulani, is deceptively simple. It's a collection of South African wedding songs with Masakela remembers vividly from his youth.

Everybody knows jazz is an American invention that mediates between African and European musical conventions. But for decades, African and European improvisers have been forging their own bonds and hybrids, without American mediation. As a case in point, here's a newly issued historical recording by the South African-born bassist Harry Miller: Harry Miller's Isipingo: Which Way Now.

Critic Milo Miles reviews the new documentary and soundtrack Amandla! about protest music in black communities of South Africa during the Apartheid years.

Critic Maureen Corrigan reviews the new novel by South African writer Andre Brink. It is titled "Imaginings of Sand." Brink first made a name for himself in the 1960s as one of a new generation of African writers who wanted their work to be more politically outspoken.

Book critic John Leonard reviews Andre Brink's new novel Cape of Storms. Brink is a white South African writer who imagines the first meeting between Europeans and native Africans.

Book critic John Leonard reviews "The Song Dog," by James McClure, and "Personal Effects," by Marissa Piesman.

Film critic Stephen Schiff reviews A World Apart, about a white anti-apartheid activist whose family needs her more than the movement does. While the film has a few missteps, Schiff says it's directed with a steady hand.