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King Leopold's Ghost: A Story of Greed, Terror, and Heroism in Colonial Africa |  | Author: Adam Hochschild
Publisher: Mariner Books
Category: Book
List Price: $15.00
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Seller: book-next-door
Rating:  204 reviews
Sales Rank: 1696
Media: Paperback
Pages: 400
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.7
Dimensions (in): 8.8 x 6 x 1
ISBN: 0618001905
Dewey Decimal Number: 967.51022
UPC: 046442001908
EAN: 9780618001903
ASIN: 0618001905
Publication Date: October 1999
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| • | Hardcover - King Leopold's Ghost: A Story of Greed, Terror and Heroism in Colonial Africa | | • | Paperback - King Leopold's Ghost: A Story of Greed, Terror, and Heroism in Colonial Africa | | • | Paperback - King Leopold's Ghost: A Story of Greed, Terror and Herois | | • | Audible Audio Edition - King Leopold's Ghost: A Story of Greed, Terror, and Heroism in Colonial Africa | | • | Paperback - King Leopold's Ghost: A Story of Greed, Terror and Heroism in the Congo | | • | Paperback - King Leopold's Ghost: A Story of Greed, Terror, and Heroism in Colonial Africa | | • | Paperback - King Leopold's Ghost : A Story of Greed, Terror, and Heroism in Colonial Africa | | • | Hardcover - King Leopold's Ghost: A Story of Greed, Terror, and Heroism in Colonial Africa |
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Amazon.com Review
King Leopold of Belgium, writes historian Adam Hochschild in this grim history, did not much care for his native land or his subjects, all of which he dismissed as "small country, small people." Even so, he searched the globe to find a colony for Belgium, frantic that the scramble of other European powers for overseas dominions in Africa and Asia would leave nothing for himself or his people. When he eventually found a suitable location in what would become the Belgian Congo, later known as Zaire and now simply as Congo, Leopold set about establishing a rule of terror that would culminate in the deaths of 4 to 8 million indigenous people, "a death toll," Hochschild writes, "of Holocaust dimensions." Those who survived went to work mining ore or harvesting rubber, yielding a fortune for the Belgian king, who salted away billions of dollars in hidden bank accounts throughout the world. Hochschild's fine book of historical inquiry, which draws heavily on eyewitness accounts of the colonialists' savagery, brings this little-studied episode in European and African history into new light. --Gregory McNamee
Product Description
In the 1880s, as the European powers were carving up Africa, King Leopold II of Belgium seized for himself the vast and mostly unexplored territory surrounding the Congo River. Carrying out a genocidal plundering of the Congo, he looted its rubber, brutalized its people, and ultimately slashed its population by ten million--all the while shrewdly cultivating his reputation as a great humanitarian. Heroic efforts to expose these crimes eventually led to the first great human rights movement of the twentieth century, in which everyone from Mark Twain to the Archbishop of Canterbury participated. King Leopold's Ghost is the haunting account of a megalomaniac of monstrous proportions, a man as cunning, charming, and cruel as any of the great Shakespearean villains. It is also the deeply moving portrait of those who fought Leopold: a brave handful of missionaries, travelers, and young idealists who went to Africa for work or adventure and unexpectedly found themselves witnesses to a holocaust. Adam Hochschild brings this largely untold story alive with the wit and skill of a Barbara Tuchman. Like her, he knows that history often provides a far richer cast of characters than any novelist could invent. Chief among them is Edmund Morel, a young British shipping agent who went on to lead the international crusade against Leopold. Another hero of this tale, the Irish patriot Roger Casement, ended his life on a London gallows. Two courageous black Americans, George Washington Williams and William Sheppard, risked much to bring evidence of the Congo atrocities to the outside world. Sailing into the middle of the story was a young Congo River steamboat officer named Joseph Conrad. And looming above them all, the duplicitous billionaire King Leopold II. With great power and compassion, King Leopold's Ghost will brand the tragedy of the Congo--too long forgotten--onto the conscience of the West.
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| Customer Reviews:
Showing reviews 1-5 of 204
 Brilliant and Desperately Needed July 27, 2010
Blusuede (NYC, NY USA)
While Hochschild does an excellent job shining a light on the happenings in the Congo from its initial colonial conquest until the downfall of its imperial master (the eponymous Leopold) perhaps his greater contribution is to remind us how little of actual history we are taught in our classes in school.
Nearly everyone of my friends who read this book was shocked and saddened and not a little astounded as to how this colossal genocide has been erased from our collective memory. The book is best seen as an exhortation to scholars and historians in general to delve deeper into those obscure lacunae of history and tell us more about what really happened on the path here
Remarkable July 24, 2010
Mark Stevens (Denver)
"King Leopold's Ghost" is a brilliant piece of historical non-fiction. The narrative examines the brutal colonization and exploitation of a huge swath of Africa in the late 19th Century under the wicked direction of King Leopold II of Belgium. Millions are slaughtered in the name of King Leopold and based on the outrageous belief that Africans were lesser people, closer to animals. Along the way, the book touches on the issues of race, greed, human rights, international politics and what it takes to call out the truth about any government and its actions. "King Leopold's Ghost" will pull you along. The narrative is straightforward and the accounts are riveting. In spots, they are even hard to digest, such as when seven-year-old African boys are whipped for laughing in the presence of a white man. "King Leopold's Ghost" plays out on a global landscape and demonstrates (how many examples do we need?) how a government can dominate when it controls the story and manipulates impressions through the media.
"Belgium's lack of great-power status meant that Leopold was dependent on cunning, above all on his skill at manipulating the press. As he waged his countercampaign, the king showed himself to be as much a master of the media as his archenemy Morel." (Morel is Edmund Dene Morel, a shipping-business worker turned journalist who mounts a relentless campaign of news stories about what's really happening in Africa.) Travel writers are dispatched and their costs are picked up in order to best showcase the "territory's delights." I can't think of a better example of the word "junket." Hostages are released before the travel writer lands in each town and prisons leveled, too. Reporters from English and German newspapers are bribed. "Readers observed similar mysterious transformations in other German newspapers," writes Hochschild. They "suddenly began publishing pro-Leopold Congo news items from `a most reliable source' or `a Congolese source' or a `well-informed source.' The newspapers Brussels correspondent, not in on the take, sent home more critical reports, including a long piece that apparently got into the paper without first being read by the editor in chief."
From beginning to end, "King of Leopold's Ghost" fascinates. The narrative involves the shape-shifting Henry Morton Stanley, Joseph Conrad, Mark Twain, Arthur Conan Doyle and a large international cast as the colony is built and later as the regime crumbles. But the book never strays far from the manipulations of "King Leopold" and his greedy, manipulative and vicious plans for self-satisfaction.
Extremely well done look at Colonial Africa during the era of the great scramble June 22, 2010
Lehigh History Student
King Leopold's Ghost provides a fascinating story of the Congo under the colonial rule of Leopold during the scramble for Africa. It is a book that covers the terror and greed inflicted by the monarch versus the efforts of several different people who worked through religion, popular press, politics and business to bring reforms to the Congo. While these reforms were motivated by different reasons they were about the stopping of essentially slave labor that was harvesting rubber and building public works projects throughout the Congo. While simplified into good and evil the author makes several valid arguments and tells a story that is often overlooked in most history books. The book is very well written, tells great anecdotal stories along with supplemental historical documents to weave together a rich text that highlights the fall of Leopold's Congo and the slave workers that practiced there. Overall you cannot get a more interesting read on this part of history and easily one of the best books written on colonial Africa. Whether you are an expert in the area or just starting out you cannot go wrong with this one.
quite simply one of the best books you will ever read May 24, 2010
ReaderDude (Washington, D.C.)
Please read this book and tell two friends what you have learned, as even highly learned people know nothing about Congo's terrible history under The King, or for that matter what is going on there now (5.4 million people killed in war in last 15 years). Although I travel to the Congo semi-regularly, you needn't be even vaguely familiar with the history of this incredible country to appreciate the human drama in this story....more villains and heroes in this book than any other in memory. It is simply a great story, and told brilliantly by the author. I can't recommend it enough. One of the best books I have read in the last decade. It will stay with you.
Well written, well researched, and heartbreaking April 20, 2010
Kellie
After reading a book about Zaire's Mobutu, I wanted to learn more of the colonial history of the Republic of Congo. Of course the story is heartbreaking-- how can it not be? But also, it is fascinating too for its description of lobbying of US congressmen by King Leopold-- yup, they could be bought just as easily then-- and the public relations work of the nascent human rights movement.
Showing reviews 1-5 of 204
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