--- title: Nelson Mandela's Life and Leadership | TIME description: More than 30 years after his release from prison, a look at the career of the world's great hero. Narrated by TIME's Managing Editor, Rick Stengel canonical: https://time.com/video/CxEd6Igs/ og:title: Nelson Mandela's Life and Leadership og:description: More than 30 years after his release from prison, a look at the career of the world's great hero. Narrated by TIME's Managing Editor, Rick Stengel og:url: https://time.com/video/CxEd6Igs/ og:image: https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/CxEd6Igs/poster.jpg?width=720 og:type: video.other twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Nelson Mandela's Life and Leadership twitter:description: More than 30 years after his release from prison, a look at the career of the world's great hero. 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They are at time.com/newsletters and are separate from a paid subscription. ## Video: Nelson Mandela's Life and Leadership [Watch (HLS stream): Nelson Mandela's Life and Leadership](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/CxEd6Igs.m3u8) (3:05)  _Published 2012-12-12. More than 30 years after his release from prison, a look at the career of the world's great hero. Narrated by TIME's Managing Editor, Rick Stengel_ --- Jul 27, 2023 3:29 PM UTC --- ## More From This Series [All Videos](https://time.com/video/) [Mandela’s Daughter Describes His Last Moments](/video/7ccbguGc/) ### Mandela’s Daughter Describes His Last Moments [World Reacts To Nelson Mandela's Passing](/video/nkpU2trX/) ### World Reacts To Nelson Mandela's Passing [Nelson Mandela \(1918-2013\)](/video/lqBrwxyF/) ### Nelson Mandela (1918-2013) --- ## Transcript [ SOUND ] Nelson Mandela was born in the Transky in South Africa in 1918, a rural and remote part of South Africa. He was the son of a head man that is the chief of a local village, but his father died when he was young and he was taken to a nearby village and raised by the King of the Timbu in the royal court. And that influenzed his ideas for leadership for the rest of his life. But when he was eighteen, he ran away to [ UNKNOWN ] went to law school and more imporatantly joined thee African National Congress which shaped his life. The struggle is my life he famously said in the ANC. Was the focus of that struggle. He became of the youth league of the ANC. He lead the defiance campaign for the ANC. Eventually he went under the ground and started the milatary wing of the ANC [ UNKNOWN ] his way. And it was while he was underground in 1960 that he was arrested and tried in the famous Rebonia trial. And sentenced to life in prison on Robben Island. What Robben Island did for Nelson Mandela is it acted as a kind of crucible for him. It refined a way. All of those traits of that young, headstrong man who went in. He came out as a measured, considered, strong, compressed person who understood not only other people, but understood himself. So many people after his release said, and would say to me. It's extraordinary that he's not bitter. But in all the days and hours we spent together, I discovered that Nelson Mandela was plenty bitter. He had enormous anger against the system, against people who had oppressed him, and particularly the people who had oppressed his wife. But he understood in a very deep and core way, and he learned this while he was on Robben Island. That he could never show his bitterness. What he needed to show was the face of forgiveness and the face of reconciliation. And that his strength and his power came from showing that face and never letting people see his own anger, his own bitterness, his own sadness. For losing, basically his entire adult life, being separated from his family, from his wife, from his children. And that was something that haunts him to this day. In all the time that Mandela and I worked together he was always keen. He always stressed that he wanted to make sure that he was depicted as a man of flesh and blood, not a man made of marble on pedestal but a man who had weaknesses and flaws. And the great generous of Nelson Mandela, the great heroism of Nelson Mandela was not that he had no flaws but that he triumphed over them. That he had weaknesses, that he understood and compensated for it. That is what a hero does. That's what Nelson Mandela has always done and that is why he continues to be an inspiration for everyone around the world. ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"Nelson Mandela's Life and Leadership","description":"More than 30 years after his release from prison, a look at the career of the world's great hero. 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