Given that not much literature (in English) is available regarding the great Amilcar Cabral, this book automatically deserves much credit and praise.
It tells, in astonishing detail and good-research, the life and times of a now very much forgotten African leader.
The book brilliantly discusses:
1. Amilcar Cabral as an outstanding academic in agriculture and in political thought.
2. Amilcar Cabral as a highly admirable person whose charisma, insistence on fairness, dialogue and forgiveness were not only admirable, but actually cost him his life.
3. Amilcar Cabral as a nationalist visionary whose political party, later guerrilla movement, was the only successful military take over of an African colonial territory: in other words, he didn't negotiate anything with the Portuguese (given their reluctance to do so) and so won the war of liberation and unilaterally declared independence.
4. Amilcar Cabral the clever diplomat: his chess-player intelligence and foresight made him respected on both sides of the Cold War spectrum, at the UN and even amongs the clandestine opposition in Portugal. Despite his war agains portuguese soldiers, most of whom forcefully conscripted, much of the Portuguese society felt sympathy towards his cause, as he insisted regularly that the struggle for freedom in Portuguese Guinea was one and the same as the aspiration for freedom in dictatorship Portugal.
However, one unfortunate element of the book is that, given the overwhelming positive impression we get from Amilcar Cabral, almost nothing is said about his personal life, aspects what although not decisive in his political legacy, would have nonetheless made for interesting reading. For instance, his divorce and second marriage is not even mentioned other than a few lines. The author Patrick Chabal can yet bring out a new edition of this book and delight us with more info!
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