Peter Friedland with Jill Margo

One Sunday in 2001 ear, nose and throat specialist Dr Peter Friedland received an unexpected call from Nelson Mandela’s personal physician. The former president was struggling to hear. Could Peter visit him at home?

Friedland discovered that Mandela was using antiquated hearing aids and was struggling to maintain them. Soon he became a regular visitor to Mandela’s home in Houghton where he experienced the elderly statesman, in the frailty of old age, away from the crowds. He was full of stories and always bearing a lesson. 

But outside Mandela’s quiet house, Friedland’s life was ricocheting from treating one victim of violent crime to another. On many days he worked as a head and neck trauma surgeon and found himself drawn into the victims’ families. When his own family and friends were exposed to violent crime, he was driven to make a life-changing decision.

In Quiet Time with the President, Friedland also examines the powerful forces that push people away from South Africa and those that pull them back. Telling his famous patient that he was planning to leave the country was insurmountably difficult for Friedland, but Mandela surprised him. 

He’d accept his leaving, but on one condition . . .

Adam Niell

Jonathan Ball Publishers

Quiet Time with the President: A doctor's story about learning to listen

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