تاريخ رجل

by Siphiwe Gloria Ndlovu, وسام حسن (Translator)

إميل كويتزي، موظّف مدني في الخمسينيات من عمره، كان يغسل عن يديه الدّماء عندما وصلت أخبار وقف إطلاق النار. وكغيره من سكان البلدة، يشعر إميل أنه غير معنيّ بما آلت إليه نتائج الصّراع، فالحرب منحته إحساسًا بالهدف والهويّة. لكن، ما الذي جعل حياة إميل مختلفة تمامًا عن حياة والديه اللذين أمضيَا أمسيات الجمعة في بهجة على وقع رقصات شارلستون وفوكستروت؟ ما الذي جرى لإميل الذي اعتاد التجوّل بين أعشاب الفيل التي تاه بين ترانيمها في السافانا؟

سيبيواي جلوريا إندلوفو، الروائية الحائزة على جوائز، تتتبَّع حياة إميل بين مرحلتي الصّبا والرجولة –من أيامه في مدرسة داخلية مرموقة تحمل شعار «هنا يصبح الأولاد رجالًا يصنعون التاريخ»، إلى وقوعه في حبّ ماريون المتهرّبة، والتي أحدثت طبيعتها الحرّة عواقب وخيمة في قلبه– لتسطّر رحلته في التحوّل إلى رجل ممزّق.

في بلدة جنوب إفريقية لم يذكر اسمها مطلقًا، وبحبكة ممزوجة بالتعاطف والكرم، تدور أحداث هذه الحكاية المتميزة حول قابلية البشر لاقتراف الأخطاء، وتبدو أشبه برحلة إلى الطبيعة الداخلية للمستعمِر.

Genres: Fiction, Novels, Historical Fiction, Africa, Literary Fiction, Southern Africa, Race

312 pages, Kindle Edition

First published October 2, 2020

About the author

Siphiwe Gloria Ndlovu is a writer, filmmaker and academic who holds a PhD from Stanford University, as well as master’s degrees in African Studies and Film. She has published research on Saartjie Baartman and she wrote, directed and edited the award-winning short film Graffiti. Born in Zimbabwe, she currently lives and works in Johannesburg. The Theory of Flight is her first novel.

Reviews

[Pebi_books · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved everything about this book. It takes us through the beginning, middle and current life of the protagonist Emil Coetzee. To best understand the man and his decisions we needed to know how it all started.

Emil Coetzee is a man on the fence about the state of things in his country. He doesn't fully side with the black natives nor with the government but his actions aid the government more than he perceives. He doesn't exactly show affection for his wife and is forever concerned about his sons sexuality.

We are taken through the political turmoil of a country in Southern Africa. The book didn't at first come off as historical fiction especially in the first and 2nd part (for me at least). I thought we were merely cruising through Emils life. And next thing I noticed is how characters from 'The theory of flight' were interwoven into the fabric of Emils life.

Also, it then dawned on me that Emil Coetzee was thee Emil Coetzee in the theory of flight.

So basically Siphiwe took a character from her first book (easily forgotten character) and spun a marvelous story that intercepts and spans the timelines of both books.

I've never been treated to such a way of telling historical fiction. To be reminded of where our political struggles started and where they are now in a manner that makes it feel like a biography of a very important man of history.

The story also looks at different relationship dynamics especially in an era where so many things were frowned upon, even a "Hippie".

Should you read the book? YES most definitely. It would be perfect if you read the theory of flight first so you can experience the wonders of connecting dots in your readers mind.

[Alison · Rating 3 out of 5]

Definitely worth a read if you liked The Theory of Flight, but I will say that it didn't quite capture my soul like the first book did. Where Theory of Flight felt like it was opening my mind to a whole new way of seeing things, with the most beautiful prose and characters that creep into your heart, History of Man just didn't quite get there for me. Having said that, it was definitely an interesting exploration of one of the more controversial side characters from ToF, so worth a read for a deeper look into a character who (from my reading at least) at first seems like just your typical white racist male.

At the same time though, I'm still trying to process how exactly I feel about the book's centering of Emil - are we supposed to forgive him for all he's done? For the atrocities he commits (which we know of from the first book)? I'm not sure, but I'm definitely looking forward to the discussion around this one.

[Keith Bain · Rating 5 out of 5]

Again and again, the force of this novel felt like something deep inside of me, urging me to take a long, hard look at myself. In other words, it's a book that compels self-reflection, internal change, and action. I was moved, riveted by the beauty and poetry of the prose, enchanted by the depth and breadth of the narrative, and blown away by its emotional thrust. It is an utterly essential read.

[محمد الجابري · Rating 3 out of 5]

الكتاب يحمل قصة تتسم بجاذبية أحداثها وتفرد مسارها الدرامي الذي يختلط بالسياسة بشكل ذكي ومدروس. تتابع الأحداث يشدّ الانتباه ويثير الفضول لمعرفة ما سيحدث لاحقًا، إذ تنجح الحبكة في بناء توترٍ درامي متصاعد يمنح القارئ تجربة مميزة.
ومع ذلك، وبحسب ذائقتي الشخصية، لم أجد ميولًا كبيرة نحو المسارات السياسية التي تناولها الكاتب، مما جعلني أحيانًا أشعر ببعض الشرود أثناء قراءة بعض الفصول المرتبطة بهذا الجانب.
لكن بالمجمل، يمكن القول إن القصة لا بأس بها، وتستحق القراءة لما فيها من توازن بين التشويق والسرد المتقن، حتى وإن لم تلامس اهتماماتي الشخصية بشكلٍ كامل

[Story · Rating 5 out of 5]

Nuanced and powerful. I couldn't put it down.

[Tutankhamun18 · Rating 5 out of 5]

this novel is fantastic!! We follow Emil Coetzee, born in colonial Rhodesia, raised in the Matopos Hills and sent to the Selous School for Boys to “become a man”. Later in life he meets his childhood friend again, who is now moving in very liberal circles that encourage equality for all man and the coexistence of the races. Emil, meanwhile is a man’s man who enjoys hunting, being in the wilderness and seducing women. One day he comes across a black woman’s corpse and no one knows who she is. This motivates him to create the Organisation of Domestic Affairs, which aims to be a non governmental organisation which records the birth, marriage and death of the “natives”. As the novel progresses and civil war breaks, this organisation turns more sinister.

The novel follows Emil’s life, his hollow marriage, his many affairs, his one true friend and his one true love, his son whom he fails and his grappling with wanting to be a “man of history” and yet living in Rhodesia at a time when it is becoming Zimbabwe and therefore such colonial ideas are in their dying light. Despite Emil’s initially good intentions, to document the history of the “natives” in the manner of the white man, he ends up with blood on his hands and participating in torture and coercion. “When a man finds himself suddenly doing the wrong thing, he prefers to believe that he has always been capable of such an act because it saves him from having to truly investigate the when, how and why of his becoming capable.”

Overall this novel focuses on toxic masculinity (and the impact that this has on an individual, his relationships, his son, his friends and his action), hope vs. hopelessness, guilt, innocence, power – specifically playing out during the colonial period. It was an absolute delight to read despite these unpleasant themes as the characters were made so human, their decisions following on one from the next so naturally, that it took the reader a few moments to realise that they had just done. This makes it incredibly powerful because we get the sense that this man committing evil acts is not himself evil, but human and nonetheless it is because of exactly such humans as him that history is filled with atrocities.

The writing style was simple, yet masterfully crafted. Ndlovu is now an author I MUST read more from, she feels like a favourite author already.

[Robyn · Rating 5 out of 5]

Is it too early to have this is my top read of 2023?
Story: amazing (and important)
characters: wonderful and genuine
Writing: utterly magnificent.

[Katie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Less of an illuminating story about a country coming out of apartheid and more of a character exploration of a truly unlikeable person. What is the point?

[Khalil Sul · Rating 4 out of 5]

رواية رجل هي تاريخ دولة وفكر استعمار الحاصل في جنوب افريقيا في قصة رجل ، التناقضات و المفارقات و المبررات التافهة التي كان الإستعمار يعطيها لنفسه في انها متفوق على باقي الأعراق.

لا زلت أرى أن الرجل الأبيض احقر من مشت قدماه على هذا الكوكب .

[Andy – And The Plot Thickens · Rating 5 out of 5]

"On the rare occasions he looked at himself in the mirror, Emil never felt anything specific; his inner world was too unresolved for him to feel settled in it. All his life he had seemed only to be able to grasp at the edges of things, never to see or experience the whole, to find himself in the middle of something that had already begun. He could have very easily been another kind of man, if he had known how to be anything else but himself."

When the reader meets the protagonist of this book, Emil Coetzee, he is washing blood off his hands. We're never told exactly whose blood, but as the story progresses we can guess at it. But this isn't a story that begins in the middle or at the end. No, Emil's story, from whence he comes (how his parents met) to where we find him at the start.

Emil is not a cruel boy. He loves the savannah of his childhood in the unnamed southern African country the book is set in (partly inspired by South Africa's history and partly by Rhodesia's). But when he is sent to an exclusive boarding school, which promises to make boys into "men of history", that he at times becomes a stranger to himself.

Throughout his life, Emil struggles to understand himself. He falls in love with Marion, a liberal and free-spirited woman, who creeps into his heart, despite the fact that she is married to his best friend. It is through Marion that he is introduced to ideas of equality between black and white.

Emil founds The Organisation of Domestic Affairs, which documents the histories of as many Black people he can find, in order to make sure they can be traced when removed from their land. He believes it to be a noble idea, because it is separate from the government. Emil does believe that one, the oppressed should be seen as equal to Europeans, but that it should happen gradually.

"Mixing the races now, he believed, was a very dangerous affair. It would give the African ideas above his station, make him feel himself to be the European's equal, which of course he was not yet. What the country desperately needed was order, everything and everyone in their place. The time would come for mixing... if mixing, if mixing did, indeed, have to take place."

The book explores how and if Emil indeed does become a man of history. How did he become one of the most powerful men in the country? How does he feel about his place in history? Siphiwe Gloria Ndlovu writes a powerful story about a flawed man, doing so with compassion. A compelling read.

[Nomzamo Thembalethu Shangase · Rating 4 out of 5]

“𝗧𝗵𝗲𝗿𝗲 𝗵𝗮𝗱 𝗯𝗲𝗲𝗻 𝗮 𝘁𝗶𝗺𝗲 𝘄𝗵𝗲𝗻 𝗵𝗲 𝗵𝗮𝗱 𝘄𝗮𝗻𝘁𝗲𝗱 𝗻𝗼𝘁𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗺𝗼𝗿𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗮𝗻 𝘁𝗼 𝗺𝗮𝗸𝗲 𝗮𝗻 𝗶𝗺𝗽𝗮𝗰𝘁 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗹𝗲𝗮𝘃𝗲 𝗵𝗶𝘀 𝗺𝗮𝗿𝗸 𝘁𝗼 𝗯𝗲 𝗮 𝗺𝗮𝗻 𝗼𝗳 𝗵𝗶𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗿𝘆.”

In this historical fiction, we are taken through the many relationships Emil forms, the life he creates without participating much in it, through the political turmoil of a country in Southern Africa and how he became the man of history.

“𝗛𝗲𝗿𝗲 𝗵𝗲 𝗹𝗮𝘆, 𝗮 𝗺𝗮𝗻 𝘄𝗵𝗼 𝗵𝗮𝗱 𝗯𝗲𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗲 𝘂𝗻𝗱𝗼𝗻𝗲 𝗯𝘆 𝗮 𝘀𝗶𝗻𝗴𝗹𝗲 𝘄𝗼𝗿𝗱.”
Part 1 and 2 of this book made me humanise and see Emily beyond what he showed to people as a feared, monstrous coloniser and as a man who didn’t care about his family.
The last 80 pages not only gripped me but triggered the hell out of me. I was particularly sadden by how Emil watched his son grow up and was proud of him from a distance. He made his child feel like a stranger to him and Emil felt like an intruder to his own son.

However, in the same tone, I found it distasteful when I read about the civil part in Rhodesia. “𝗡𝗮𝗺𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗱𝗲𝗮𝗱 𝗯𝗹𝗮𝗰𝗸 𝗯𝗼𝗱𝗶𝗲𝘀 𝘄𝗼𝘂𝗹𝗱 𝗺𝗮𝗸𝗲 𝗶𝘁 𝗱𝗶𝗳𝗳𝗶𝗰𝘂𝗹𝘁 𝘁𝗼 𝗸𝗶𝗹𝗹 𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗺 𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗵 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗸𝗶𝗻𝗱 𝗼𝗳 𝗯𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗱 𝗴𝘂𝘀𝘁𝗼 𝘁𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝘄𝗮𝘀 𝗻𝗲𝗰𝗲𝘀𝘀𝗮𝗿𝘆 𝗱𝘂𝗿𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗮 𝘁𝗶𝗺𝗲 𝗼𝗳 𝘄𝗮𝗿…𝗶𝘁 𝗶𝘀 𝘃𝗲𝗿𝘆 𝗱𝗶𝗳𝗳𝗶𝗰𝘂𝗹𝘁 𝘁𝗼 𝗸𝗶𝗹𝗹 𝘀𝗼𝗺𝗲𝗼𝗻𝗲 𝘄𝗵𝗼𝘀𝗲 𝗻𝗮𝗺𝗲 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗵𝗶𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗿𝘆 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝗸𝗻𝗼𝘄.” Now, how can that not leave an after taste !?
The audacity of the white men showed in Rutherford (Emily’s friend), I wanted to slap his face every time he appeared 😒

I think Siphiwe’s simple and alluring writing style made it easy to enjoy this book whilst also making me be on the fence (just like our main character) on certain situations.
An absolute gem. A 10/10. Definitely recommend you get this read.

[Clare Grové · Rating 5 out of 5]

N
2021 alphabet of authors

Sheer perfection.

Ndlovu’s style is sophisticated in its simplicity. While easy to read, the turn of phrase is unique and intellectual. Her use of repetition is skilful and deliberate in intention. While I certainly missed the use of the triple so brilliantly used in her debut novel, The Theory of Flight, there was actually nothing missing from this offering.

The tale of a society, the tale of a country, told through a man’s life starting at the end and then “chronologically told in a linear fashion, with a definite beginning, middle and end”. This is a real history. This can not be read in history books.

[Paige Nick · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is set in a South African place that is never named. It's about a country at a terrible point in history. It's about the politics and racism, and towards the end about the war and loss. But it's more about people and their stories and character and nuances. It's about a boy becoming a man here, and then spending his life discovering what kind of man he has become. Yes, a man of history, but also a man of desire and flaws. The writing is just so true. It's a beautifully crafted novel.

[Amr · Rating 5 out of 5]

تاريخ رجل هي رواية غنية التفاصيل و الاحداث عن فترة الفصل العنصري في روديسيا (زمبابوي) و تروي حياة اميل كويتزي منذ مرحلة الطفولة حتي مرحلة الرجولة
في فترة صعبة في تاريخ روديسيا ومدي التغير و عنصرية البيض في هذة الفترة الحساسة
رواية رائعة بامتياز و القراء الاولي للكاتبة الافريقية سيبواي جلوريا ولن تكون الاخيرة و الشكر لعصير الكتب علي هذة الترجمة المميزة
تستحق ٥ نجوم بجدارة

[Emma badr · Rating 4 out of 5]

.لدي مشاعر متناقضة تجاه هذا الكتاب، لكن بشكل عام استمتعت بقراءته. كنت أتمنى لو كانت الترجمة أكثر سلاسة في بعض الأجزاء

[Mish Middelmann · Rating 5 out of 5]

As a sensitive boy. Emil is bewildered when his parents stop dancing together - and later even stop talking to each other. His father's sensitivity is excoriated for showing up in nonbinary ways. Fifty years later Emil can't scrub the human blood off his hands. I weep for his lost humanity - and the power the system gives his hollow manhood to destroy others.

This history of man is both broadly archetypal and extremely specific. I found I could identify with key moments of the emotional history of the white man whose story she tells with so much empathy - and yet was left wondering how he ended up with blood on his hands? Ndlovu challenges herself to tell the story of a coloniser of her native land "in an objective but empathetic style ... in a linear chronology with a beginning, middle and end" and she does this with amazing depth and kindness. The book also has a very masculine cadence, a sense of order and progress even as it descends into the heart of darkness.

Yet she never glosses over the brutality of the colonisers. Ultimately she follows Aimé Césaire's injunction to

First ... study how colonialism works to decivilise the coloniser, to brutalise him in the true sense of the word, to degrade him, to awaken him to buried instincts, to covetousness, violence, race hatred and moral relativisim.

And I am left rocked by the mixture of horror at the central character's loss of humanity, together with the continuing slender thread of the gentle beauty he was born with.

Emil starts life feeling awkward and sensitive, hurt by his parents' lost love and turning that pain to blaming himself. As the book is a history of manhood, I see how we are born with human hearts and sensitivities, and then met with a world that usually beats it out of us - like the Selous School that has a harsh mission to make boys into their idea of men. Their manhood includes bullying and abuse of women along with the more innocuous sporting favourites of many males.

For me this is a clear commentary on the dual nature of making men: some parts, just what boys and men like or enjoy. Other parts, hateful and hurtful to ourselves and others.

So much of this feels like my own history as a white man growing up in colonial southern Africa and going to an all-boys' school, not knowing quite what to do with my sensitivity. Yet my story diverges from his. Why and how? In the end, some of it might be down to luck.

In my review of Ndlovu's previous book, The Theory of Flight I admired the way the author "stands for our power of choice in how we respond no matter how awful our circumstances." Yet her portrayal of Emil's descent into callous brutality reveals how little he actually experiences the power of choice. It seems as if he just loses his way. With exquisite care, Ndlovu shows us the choices he makes, while narrating those choices with his voice - which shows just how little they feel like choices to him.

It is easy to moralise from the outside that he chooses empty sex over loving relationships, for example. But Ndlovu actually shows us how he loses himself when he falls in love and doesn't feel as if he has a choice or a chance with her. When he finally does discover some personal love in his life at the end of the book, he lets another force much bigger than himself - systemic racism - take it away again. It is a choice, and one I see so many of my white brothers taking in this world, with horrific outcomes. But to Emil it seems simply like the only way to be.

She also does really well in juxtaposing Emil's genuine love for the land with the twisted paternalism and racism that draws him into a career which ultimately turns brutal towards the majority of his compatriots, simply because of their blackness. I recognise this: many white colonisers somehow claim humanity from loving the land while dehumanising the people of the land.

And I believe she is accurate in revealing the micro-opportunities that simply pass Emil by, like the time he finds himself on the black side of town "feeling a happiness that seemed almost forgotten" as the music and rhythms of the township seep into his bones. Belonging as he does to a racist system, he quickly dismisses any thought of embracing the diversity that surrounds him.

The first half of the book barely mentions the racial context of the then Rhodesia, in line with the blissful unawareness experienced by many white people privileged by colonialism. Within this fragile bubble, Ndlovu focuses on unfolding Emil's experiences with women. In the second half of the book, the gathering civil war asserts itself along with Emil's entry into that war that is cloaked in apparent paternalistic benevolence toward "the African" held mythically inferior. As the violence grows, I believe Ndlovu is chillingly, historically correct in demonstrating how much the white eye overlooked the murderous violence unleashed to protect white privilege.

So much is illuminated through this remarkable story, whose style is so different to the first in the trilogy. I am eager to read the final volume The Quality of Mercy and grateful to Siphiwe Gloria Ndlovu for sharing her heart and her craft.

May, 2023 note:
My reviews of the other volumes are here:
* Volume 1, The Theory of Flight;
* Volume 3, The Quality of Mercy;

[Michael Morrison · Rating 2 out of 5]

Very misleading title, and a lack of adequate proof-reading, don't totally detract from some beautiful writing, but ultimately this is awfully like a soap opera.
I picked up the book because it is from Africa and I was hoping for a story about black Africans.
I was more than surprised, because the author is black, to see it is about white people, though it is also about those white people's attitudes and actions in regard to the black Africans around them.
This fictional book is set in a fictional country and has all kinds of potential, but ultimately it just fizzles, just kind of dribbles to a ... well, actually, not to an end.
It just, as I said, dribbles to a stop with no real conclusion.
I also want to repeat the writing is beautiful, with the author showing a firm grasp of the English language, but able also to use her own unique style, using some of her own phrases repetitively in a clever and even entertaining way.
Though I was disappointed with the in-lieu-of ending, I do want to see more of this author's work.
I suppose I can recommend "The History of Man" for itself, but beware the ending.

[Janet Rodriguez · Rating 5 out of 5]

The second of a series about an unnamed country in sub-Saharan Africa, The History of Man is a truthful and brutal offering, a hyper-realistic picture of Zimbabwe's relatively recent revolution. Ndlovu doesn't name the country, but her unnamed African country bears a remarkable resemblance to her homeland, written in living color, with all the beautiful and powerful language that earmarks Zimbabwean literature. The story of Emil Coetzee, a white man who is part of an oppressive government, is told with sensitivity and authority. The parade of characters are all believable, fully formed, and the realistic dialogue is notable throughout. Without casting spoilers, I can say the book is a faithful narrative of the truth, always brave and unswerving from the charging train that is revolution.

[Penny de Vries · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a remarkable novel. The writer delves deep into the psyche of an ordinary man, a man who struggles to find his moral centre, a man swept up in notions of glory and achievement. But also a country suffering the same fate as his.
The period covers the late twenties to the late seventies in an unnamed pre-independence Zimbabwe.
I marvel at the depiction of these times, so fully brought to life. All with a subtle underlying irony.
Nothing I write here can do justice to this work.

[Nahla Khaled · Rating 3 out of 5]

ما الذى يمنعه أن يكون حيوانا؟
ما الذى يجعله رجلا؟
ما هى السمات المحددة لصفة الرجل؟
ما يجعل الرجل رجلا هى قصة حياته..
• توجد سنوات لطرح الأسئلة، و أخرى للإجابة عنها.
• التاريخ-هذا الشئ الذى تتدعى فهمه و دعمه و معرفته جيدا-يقف إلى جانبنا، سيذكرنا التاريخ، و سيذكر كفاحنا الباسل فى هذه اللحظة، نحن نخوض حربا محقة، نحن نمضى قدما فى مسيرة الزمن. ستخلد أسماؤنا. لن يتذكرك التاريخ، لا أنت و لا الأشخاص من أمثالك، أنتم محكمون بالنسيان، لا يكافئ التاريخ أولئك الذين يسعون إلى عرقلة مسيرة تقدمه.

[Will · Rating 5 out of 5]

A superb book

This was an excellent read. Took me through the horrors of colonialism & in the mind of the colonizer. Being from the City of Kings myself, I could really picture all the landmarks.

[Noli · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent read, especially if you’re into historical fiction. There was a familiarity to the scenes and spaces, and Siphiwe brought Emil to life in such an astonishing way. Reading this made me want to try again with Theory of Flight!

[Sinobia · Rating 5 out of 5]

Emil Coetzee is the simplest yet complex person I have come across in literature, and the linear yet circular account for his journey was just a wonderful emotional experience.

Thank you for this beautiful piece of work Siphiwe Ndlovu. 🌻

[Raymond Wolf · Rating 4 out of 5]

A solid four star
Interesting enough I was reading this book at the same time as Scatterings, both books men Frederick Courtney Selous. A very interesting read, and went by it very quick.

[Cecilia Ahmed · Rating 3 out of 5]

روايه لطيفه تعبر عن الذي يمكن يحدث للابناء بسبب هفوات او عدم مسؤليه الاباء في اطار اجتماعي يبين ايضا مدي تأثير العنصربه علي حياه البشر

[Alex Handyside · Rating 4 out of 5]

Well written, interesting with great but flawed characters.

[Jerry Finke · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love when a book makes you stop reading from time to time so you can enjoy it a bit longer. This was one of those books for me.

[Anita · Rating 5 out of 5]

An amazingly astute perception of the psychology of a white male growing up in a time of great conflict in an African country.
Emil Coetzee, a boy from a troubled background, struggles to find his place in a rapidly changing land. He is torn between his belief in the freedom of man to choose a path, and his role in the Organisation specifically created to curtail all freedom for the majority of its country’s citizens. In order to carve out a significant position in this rapidly changing world, he suppresses his emotions to become the “real man of history” his education at the Selous School for Boys brain washed its students to enshrine.
The failure of his marriage, loss of his only true friend, and his son, further isolate Emil from his own emotions. Only by suppressing his feelings of love, empathy and trust is he able to continue to function in the Organisation, and in his personal life. He grows to hate himself, and longs for his early carefree childhood days in a rural environment, where he had once found the freedom he so desperately now seeks.
A deeply rewarding read. Beautifully written, in prose so evocative, the reader can feel the rhythm of Africa, sense the encroaching darkness, and walk through the swaying elephant grass together with Emil.