The book's significance resides in the fact that the book's owner, Sonny Venkatratham, passed it to a number of his fellow political prisoners in the single cells, including Nelson Mandela, asking them to mark their favourite passages with a signature and date. Informally known as "The Robben Island Bible", numerous prisoners selected the speeches that meant the most to them and their experience as political prisoners.
In 2008 and 2010, playwright Matthew Hahnconducted interviews with eight former political prisoners in South Africa who were on Robben Island and signed Sonny’s ‘Bible’.
Offering a vivid and startling account of the experience of these political prisoners during Apartheid, his extraordinary verbatim play called "The Robben Island Shakespeare" weaves Shakespeare's words together with first-hand accounts from these men. They offer their reflections on their time as Liberation activists and, twenty years later, on the costs, consequences and whether or not it was all worth it.
For more information about the play and the accompanying Ethical Leadership Workshops, please visit The Robben Island Shakespeare website
