Altered State

A team of Guardian writers go to South Africa to find out the truth behind the headlines in South Africa. They include Hugo Young, Michael Billington, Georgina Henry, Alex Brummer, Alan Rusbridger, Angela Johnson, Doug Morrison, Ian Mayes, Judy Rumbold, Roger Ormond, David Beresford and the Guardian award-winning photographer, Don McPhee. South Africa's future hangs in the balance. President F.W. de Klerk has burned most of the bridges with his country's tortured past and is committed to negotiating the shape of the future. But what shape will that future take? What compromises will be reached, what deals struck? And how can the people bury the hatred and bitterness that has divided the land? The contributors talked to politicians, businessmen, editors, teachers, writers, housewives, lawyers, children, policemen, refugees, gays, actors, servants and churchmen about the future - and about how the past will affect that future. They put together a spectrum of pieces about a country which is usually reported in one-dimensional terms. The book also includes essays by the South-African writers, Breyten Breytenbach and Es'Kia Mphahlelc.