Mark Mathabane (born Johannes Mathabane, 18 October 1960) is a South African author, lecturer, and a former collegiate tennis player and college professor.
Early life in South Africa
Mathabane was born in Alexandra, South Africa, an area that is a part of Johannesburg, the capital of the province of Gauteng. He was born to a life of poverty in the apartheid political setting of South Africa. His father was Jackson Mathabane, a Venda labourer who had an income of $10 a month. Mathabane has also stated that his father struggled with alcohol and gambling, and was even abusive. Magdalene Mathabane was Mathabane's mother. She had been sold to Jackson Mathabane as a wife at the age of fifteen by her mother. Jackson and Magdalene Mathabane had seven children, of whom Mark Mathabane was the eldest.
Life in the ghetto
Mathabane and his family lived in a one-square-mile ghetto which was also home to more than 200,000 other individuals. Food was scarce in this ghetto,
Life in America
Tennis and move to America
1972 Wimbledon tennis star Stan Smith and his wife, Marjory Gengler, were a key element in helping Mathabane obtain a tennis scholarship to the United States. As stated on Mathabane's website, the fund's mission is to "create hope in an impoverished, bleak part of the world by providing scholarships, books, uniforms and school supplies for needy children attending Bovet Primary School in Alexandra Township, South Africa." This book was listed as number one on the Washington Post's best-sellers list, and as number three on the New York Times best-seller list. Mathabane wrote his first novel Ubuntu. The Proud Liberal is a modern-day thriller, which deals with controversial issues such as terrorism, racism, and intolerance in America.