Donald Woods was that very rare sort of journalist who gives journalists a good name: a brave and principled man who fought apartheid and, following the assassination of Steve Biko, which he did much to expose to the world, was “banned”, that is put under house arrest, by the South African government for his troubles.

He wasn’t always this though and his autobiography is an honest account of his education from a prejudiced youth to freedom fighter and prisoner of conscience, though he would probably never have described himself this way: his autobiography suggests he was a man who had a lovely sense of humour about himself and the world. This, and his passionate rage against injustice illuminates his account of his life reporting apartheid South Africa, which is told in the snappy prose style of a gifted newspaperman.