BOOK REVIEW: Arriving Where One Was Never Expected: Coming In From The Cold – An Autobiography by Bonang Mohale

 

Autobiographies often begin at the beginning: with birth, lineage, and chronological memory unfolding toward accomplishment. In Coming In From The Cold – An Autobiography, Bonang Mohale disrupts this convention. He does not introduce himself first as a corporate leader, activist, or public intellectual. Instead, he situated himself in the present: as husband to Susan and as father to his two daughters, Nkgono Tshepiso Serialong and Nkgono Maneo Refiooe. This structural decision is deliberate and philosophical. It announces that identity, for Mohale, is relational before it is professional.

Image of the book cover from the internet 

From the outset, the reader encounters a grounded man whose leadership is anchored in humility, honour, and emotional accountability. The naming of his daughters is particularly significant. The prefix “Nkgono,” meaning grandmother, is a deliberate homage to ancestry. Within African naming traditions, names function as living archives; they preserve genealogy and resist erasure. By foregrounding this tradition, Mohale subtly asserts that progress without memory is incomplete. His autobiography thus opens not with ambition, but with continuity.

The title itself, Coming In From The Cold, carries profound metaphorical weight. Mohale explains that it captures “the feeling of stepping into spaces where we were never expected, welcomed or even imagined.” This phrase reverberates deeply within the historical landscape of South Africa. The “cold” signifies institutional exclusion, racial marginalisation, and the psychological distance imposed by apartheid. To “come in” suggests not only entry but the belonging, a reclamation of warmth and legitimacy in spaces historically reserved for others.

The narrative moves fluidly across the intersections of boyhood dreams in Katlehong, political awakening, married life, fatherhood, corporate ascendancy, spirituality, and African Humanism. Importantly, Mohale resists the mythology of the self-made man. He consistently acknowledges what might be described as an entourage - mentors, family members, colleagues, and companions who shaped his trajectory. His life is framed not as solitary conquest but as collective becoming. In this, the ethos of motho ke motho ka batho, - a person is a person through other persons - permeates the text.

One of the most striking episodes, particularly from a creative standpoint, is the portrait of a seventeen-year-old Bonang entering a short story competition. His piece, The Night I Played Santa Claus, won the Ellerines Prize, and he received his cash award formally from the furniture company, afforded his school to celebrate him with a party in his honour. This moment is not trivial nostalgia; it is revelatory. It exposes the imaginative interiority of a young man already attentive to human complexity. Through the story’s lead character, Thabo, one glimpses the emotional intelligence and compassion that would later define his leadership style.

This early literary achievement complicates any simplistic reading of Mohale as a purely corporate strategist. Before the chairman and executive, there was a storyteller. Before the statesman, there was a teenager imagining warmth and dignity in constrained circumstances. In many ways, this creative foundation foreshadows his later human-centred leadership philosophy.

His life, however, unfolds against formidable structural odds. In 1981, through special ministerial consent from the apartheid government, Mohale was admitted to study Medicine at the University of the Witwatersrand - one of only a handful of Black students permitted entry into a dominantly white institution. The symbolic tension here is stark: entry granted not as inherent right, but as exceptional allowance. This episode encapsulates the paradox faced by many Black South Africans whose excellence forced the gates open, yet under conditions defined by exclusion.

Mohale’s journey would later move from medicine into marketing, where he became a Chartered Marketer and rose to executive leadership and board chairmanships, becoming a household name within South Africa’s corporate sector. Yet what distinguishes his narrative is how he frames power. Success is not described as self-congratulation, but as stewardship. He consciously leveraged his influence to open doors for others, particularly Black women, translating personal advancement into collective upliftment.

The arc of his life finds powerful resonance in his appointment as Chancellor of the University of the Free State, the eighth chancellor in the institution’s 122-year history. The symbolism is profound: a Black man once admitted to a white university through special consent now occupies ceremonial and moral leadership within a historically white institution. The metaphor of “coming in from the cold” returns here with renewed intensity. He is not merely entering the space; he is reshaping its moral climate.

Stylistically, Mohale writes with measured humility. The tone is reflective rather than sensational. While the narrative leans toward affirmation and inspiration, occasionally smoothing over sharper conflicts that might have yielded deeper vulnerability, this appears intentional. The autobiography is not a confessional spectacle but constructive testimony. It is guided by ethical steadiness rather than dramatic exposure.

Perhaps the most enduring quality of Coming In From The Cold is its invitation to introspection. As readers journey through Mohale’s life, they are compelled to consider their own positionality: What spaces are we entering that were once denied to us? How are we honouring those who came before us? What legacy are we shaping, knowingly or unknowingly, from the moment of our birth?

Ultimately, this autobiography is not merely a chronicle of corporate ascent or institutional recognition. It is a meditation on belonging - within family, nation, and the broader universe. It challenges dominant narratives of leadership by centering empathy, memory, and collective responsibility. In an era often characterised by abrasive public discourse and self-promotion, Mohale’s story stands out for its grounded ethical centre.

Mohale closes Coming In From The Cold not with self-congratulation, but with a letter - a direct, almost intimate appeal to the reader. In the final pages, the autobiography shifts from testimony to summons. He cajoles, challenges and encourages the reader to take a stance - not someday, but now. Leadership, he insists, is neither accidental nor reserved for the titled few; it is a birthright and a noble obligation. It is the responsibility to step into spaces, to warm cold rooms, and to lift others as one rises.

By signing off in this way, Mohale ensures that the story does not end with him. It continues in the reader. The book becomes more than an autobiography; it is a living guide for anyone who seeks to contribute to humanity through ethical, voice-of-reason leadership. Written in accessible, measured prose, it is an easy yet profound read - a gift of a special kind, accommodating the reader of any pace while leaving none behind. Ultimately, Coming In From The Cold reminds us that coming in from the cold is not merely about personal arrival but about claiming one’s moral agency for the advancement and betterment of humanity itself.

The book is published by Tracey McDonald Publishers and is available at bookstores nationwide at R360.

Chepape Makgato is a multi award winning visual artist, arts writer and curator. He is a Chief Curator at William Humphreys Art Gallery. He is a chairperson of the South African Museums Association Central (Free State and Northern Cape). He serves on the panel of Acquisition Committee of ArtBank South Africa. He has a Master's Degree in Fine Art from University of Witwatersrand and is completing his PhD in Art and Music at UNISA. He is a Research Fellow in Faculty of Humanities at Sol Plaatje University. Chepape is a 2026 Senior Artist Fellow of Leuphana Institute of Advance Studies at Leuphana University of Luneburg in Germany.