Class 10 English First Flight Chapter 2, Nelson Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom, is an autobiographical extract from Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela’s memoir recounting the historic inauguration of South Africa’s first democratic, non-racial government on 10 May 1994 at the Union Buildings amphitheatre in Pretoria. The chapter PDF also includes Leslie Norris’s poem A Tiger in the Zoo.
What Class 10 English (First Flight) Chapter 2 Covers
Prose: Nelson Mandela — Long Walk to Freedom describes the swearing-in ceremony attended by dignitaries from over 140 countries, South Africa’s two national anthems (Nkosi Sikelel’ iAfrika and Die Stem), Mandela’s tribute to past anti-apartheid patriots (Oliver Tambo, Walter Sisulu, Chief Luthuli, Yusuf Dadoo, Bram Fischer, Robert Sobukwe), his definition of courage as the triumph over fear (not the absence of fear), the ‘twin obligations’ of every person (to family and to community/country), how his boyhood ‘transitory freedoms’ matured into a hunger for the freedom of all his people, and why both the oppressor and the oppressed are robbed of their humanity.
Poem: A Tiger in the Zoo (Leslie Norris) contrasts a tiger pacing in ‘quiet rage’ on pads of velvet quiet inside a concrete zoo cell—ignoring visitors and staring at the brilliant stars—with how he should be lurking in shadow in the jungle, sliding through long grass near the water hole where plump deer pass, and snarling around houses at the jungle’s edge.
Exercises in Chapter 2
- Oral Comprehension Check & Thinking about the Text cover why 10 May is an ‘autumn day’ in South Africa (Southern Hemisphere), what Mandela means by ‘an extraordinary human disaster’ (Apartheid), what the ‘twin obligations’ are, and why Mandela says the oppressor must be liberated just as surely as the oppressed.
Read Class 10 English (First Flight) Chapter 2 Online
More Chapters
- Previous: Chapter 1: A Letter to God (with Poems: Dust of Snow & Fire and Ice)
- Next: Chapter 3: Two Stories about Flying (with Poems: How to Tell Wild Animals & The Ball Poem)
- Workbook companion: Words and Expressions II Unit 2: Nelson Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom
- All English (First Flight) chapters and the other Class 10 books: Class 10 NCERT books 2026-27
- All Class 1 to 12 NCERT Textbooks: NCERT Books PDF (Class 1–12)
- Every book chapter by chapter: NCERT chapter wise PDF
FAQ
What ‘twin obligations’ does Nelson Mandela mention in ‘Long Walk to Freedom’?
Mandela states that every man has twin obligations in life: first, obligations to his family, his parents, his wife and children; and second, an obligation to his people, his community and his country. Under Apartheid in South Africa, a person of colour who tried to fulfil his duty to his people was inevitably ripped from his family and forced to live a life apart.
How does Nelson Mandela define courage?
Mandela learned from his comrades in the struggle that courage is not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it; the brave man is not he who does not feel afraid, but he who conquers that fear.