I Die, but the Memory Lives on

By Henning Mankell and Archbishop Desmond Tutu

Henning Mankell, internationally famous creator of the bestselling Kurt Wallander mysteries, here offers a nonfiction fable about a heartrending tradition spawned by a major health crisis: the invaluable Memory Book Project, which gives those dying of AIDS an opportunity to record 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 elderlythose 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 the 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.

Featuring a foreword by Archbishop Desmond Tutu, the book includes an appendix listing AIDS organizations and resources. A portion of the book’s proceeds with be donated to AIDS charities in Africa.

• Language: English
• Publisher: The New Press
• Release date: Dec 1, 2005
• ISBN: 9781595585776

Reviews for I Die, but the Memory Lives on

[lunacat_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This wasn't the book I was expecting when I first picked it up, but instead a succinct and informative look on what it is really like to be an african with AIDS, and what impact AIDS is having on this continent.There were some personal stories, interspersed with the facts and figures, as well as Mankell's own reactions to the things he finds out.This was a short book, and one that every single person in this world should read. It scared me, opened my eyes and filled me with such sorrow for the people who have been touched by this disease, and the disparity between those in western civilisation who are HIV+, and those in Africa.In one line: A must read for every single person who remotely cares about AIDS and its effects, or wants to learn to care.