Burger's Daughter

Burger's Daughter is an historical novel by the South African writer Nadine Gordimer, first published in the United Kingdom in 1979 by Jonathan Cape. The book was not published in South Africa because it was expected to be banned in that country. A month after publication in London, the import and sale of the book in South Africa was prohibited, although the restriction was lifted six months later.

Burger's Daughter is about white anti-apartheid activists in South Africa seeking to overthrow the South African government. Written in the wake of the 1976 Soweto uprising, it follows the life of Rosa, the title character, as she comes to terms with her father Lionel's legacy as an activist in the South African Communist Party (SACP) over the course of 30 years. The perspective shifts between Rosa's internal monologue (often directed towards her father or her semi-lover Conrad), and the omniscient narrator. The novel is routed in the history of the anti-apartheid struggle in South Africa with references to actual events and people from that period.

Gordimer herself was involved in South African struggle politics, and she knew many of the activists, including Bram Fischer, Nelson Mandela's treason trial defence lawyer. She described Burger's Daughter as "a coded homage" to Fischer. While still banned in South Africa, a copy of the book was smuggled into Mandela's prison cell on Robben Island, and he reported that he "thought well of it".

The novel was well received by critics. A review in The New York Times said that Burger's Daughter is Gordimer's "most political and most moving novel", and a review in The New York Review of Books described the style of writing as "elegant", "fastidious" and belonging to a "cultivated upper class".