Title: Zambia shall be free: Kenneth Kaunda
Photographer(s): Various photographers
Writer(s): Kenneth Kaunda
Designer(s):
Publisher(s): Einemann Educational Books Ltd., London, England
Year: 1969
Print run:
Language(s): English
Pages: 202
Size: 12,5 x 18,5 cm
Binding: Softcover
Edition: 1st 1962
Print: St.Paul's Press Ltd,Malta
Nation(s) and year(s) of Protest: Zambia,1961
ISBN:
This book was published in 1962, 2 years before Zambian Independence, and the author would become the first president of the new nation. It is fascinating to see what life was like during this critical time
Kenneth Kaunda (aka KK) was born in Lubwa (Chinsali District in the northeast of modern-day Zambia), the eighth child of the missionary David Kaunda. You can see a picture from Lubwa during this time period on the University of Southern California Archive site here. There were high expectations for him, but he struggled with health problems. One of KK’s vivid recollections was when he almost had to drop out of school because the family couldn’t afford the fees. “For so small a thing in those days could a child for ever forfeit the privilege of his life’s education” pg 10. He went on to become a teacher, and became more aware of the injustices occurring in what was then Northern and Southern Rhodesia.
KK and his wife supported themselves by selling secondhand clothes (more on salaula here) as well as produce like orange, lemon, guava, pawpaw and mango. An avid reader, he singles out Arthur Mee’s Talks To Boys and In Tune With The Infinite by Ralph Waldo Trine as particularly influential for him. African soldiers returning from World War 2 were disillusioned by their unequal treatment during the war and their bleak prospects upon returning home.
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