MARTIN MEREDITH

The odyssey of the Reitz family passes like a thread through the tapestry of South African history in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Originally Dutch-Afrikaner gentry from the Cape, the family moved to the frontier settlement of Bloemfontein and played a key role in the building of the Orange Free State. At the heart of this tale is the extraordinary career of Deneys Reitz, whose account of his adventures in the field during the Anglo-Boer War (1899-1902), published as Commando, became a classic of irregular warfare. Martin Meredith interweaves Reitzs experiences, taken from his unpublished notebooks, with the wider story of Britains brutal suppression of Boer resistance. Concise and readable, and featuring rare photographs from the family archives, Afrikaner Odyssey is a wide-ranging portrait of a distinguished Afrikaner family whose presence is still marked on the South African landscape.

La nueva África surgida de la independencia parecía destinada a brillar en el mundo. Líderes jóvenes y entusiastas se comprometían a fomentar la educación, la sanidad, el empleo y la tierra para todos. En un mundo en pleno boom económico, las nuevas naciones afrontaban el futuro rebosantes de recursos naturales. África parecía destinada a una era de progreso sin precedentes. ¿Cómo es posible que aquel sueño se truncara de forma tan brutal? ¿Por qué el continente africano se ha convertido hoy en sinónimo de pobreza, guerra, corrupción y confl ictos tribales? Meredith nos sumerge en los últimos cincuenta años de historia africana en busca de las raíces del problema, en un estudio tan apasionado como exhaustivo que, sin olvidar la responsabilidad de las potencias occidentales, también señala a las elites corruptas surgidas de la propia África. Y vemos el papel decisivo de las grandes personalidades, desde líderes comprometidos con su pueblo como Senghor en Senegal o Mandela en Sudáfrica hasta los controvertidos guías carismáticos como Nasser, Mugabe o Lumumba. Un libro imprescindible no sólo para comprender la realidad de África y su actual situación, sino también para plantear el urgente y necesario debate sobre su futuro.

In this vast and vivid panorama of history, Martin Meredith, bestselling author of The State of Africa, follows the fortunes of Africa over a period of 5,000 years. With compelling narrative, he traces the rise and fall of ancient kingdoms and empires; the spread of Christianity and Islam; the enduring quest for gold and other riches; the exploits of explorers and missionaries; and the impact of European colonisation. He examines, too, the fate of modern African states and concludes with a glimpse into their future. This is history on an epic scale.

Africa does not give up its secrets easily. Buried there lie answers about the origins of humankind and the dawn of civilisation. Through a century of archaeological investigation, scientists have transformed our understanding of the beginnings of human life, although vital clues still remain hidden. In Born in Africa, Martin Meredith follows the trail of discoveries about our human origins made by scientists over the last hundred years, as well as describing the history of scholarship in this incredibly exciting field. He relates the intense rivalries, personal feuds and fierce controversies that shaped the study and perception of Africa, and recounts the feats of skill and endurance that have illuminated thousands of years of human evolution. The results have been momentous. Scientists have identified more than twenty species of extinct humans and firmly established Africa as the birthplace not only of humankind, but also of our own species: homo sapiens, the modern human. Scientific study has revealed how early technology, language ability and artistic endeavour all originated in Africa, and scientists have shown how, in an exodus sixty thousand years ago, small groups of Africans left their birthplace to populate the rest of the world. We all have an African legacy, and in this fascinating and informative book Martin Meredith leads us back to the place where we have rediscovered our common human heritage.

Meredith has given a spectacularly clear view of the African political jungle SpectatorThis book is hard to beat... Elegantly written as well as unerringly accurate Financial Times The fortunes of Africa have changed dramatically since the independence era began in 1957. As Europes colonial powers withdrew, dozens of new states were born. Africa was a continent rich in mineral resources and its economic potential was immense. Yet, it soon struggled with corruption, violence and warfare, with few states managing to escape the downward spiral. So what went wrong? In this riveting and authoritative account, Martin Meredith examines the myriad problems that Africa has faced, focusing upon key personalities, events and themes of the independence era. He brings his compelling analysis into the modern day, exploring Africas enduring struggles for democracy and the rising influence of China. It is essential reading for anyone seeking to understand the continents plight and its hopes for a brighter future.

Nelson Mandela stands out as one of the most admired political figures of the twentieth century. It was his leadership and moral courage above all that helped to deliver a peaceful end to apartheid in South Africa after years of racial division and violence and to establish a fledgling democracy there. Martin Merediths vivid portrayal of this towering leader was originally acclaimed by the Sunday Timesas a fitting epitaph to an extraordinary career and by the Daily Telegraphas a compelling account of the whole of Mandelas life. Merediths acclaimed biography incorporates a decade of additional perspective and hindsight on the man and his legacy and examines how far his hopes for the new South Africa were realised. Mandelais the most thorough and up-to-date account available of the life of its most revered hero.

Yet elephant history has been dominated by periods of brutality and persecution, used in gladiatorial combat, as weapons of war (most notably by Hannibal) and for their ivory, prized since ancient times as a symbol of wealth and status. As the ivory trade continued there are now only five countries with sizeable elephant populations, where a few hundred years ago there were forty-six before the European hunters arrived.|Acclaimed African expert Martin Meredith has written the first full biography of the elephant - wide-ranging, moving and never less than fascinating in his travels through the history and present of Nature s great masterpiece (John Donne).

Robert Mugabe came to power in Zimbabwe in 1980 after a long civil war in Rhodesia. The white minority government had become an international outcast in refusing to give in to the inevitability of black majority rule. Finally the defiant white prime minister Ian Smith was forced to step down and Mugabe was elected president. Initially he promised reconciliation between white and blacks, encouraged Zimbabwes economic and social development, and was admired throughout the world as one of the leaders of the emerging nations and as a model for a transition from colonial leadership. But as Martin Meredith shows in this history of Mugabes rule, Mugabe from the beginning was sacrificing his purported idealsand Zimbabwes potentialto the goal of extending and cementing his autocratic leadership. Over time, Mugabe has become ever more dictatorial, and seemingly less and less interested in the welfare of his people, treating Zimbabwes wealth and resources as spoils of war for his inner circle. In recent years he has unleashed a reign of terror and corruption in his country. Like the Congo, Angola, Rwanda, Sierra Leone and Liberia, Zimbabwe has been on a steady slide to disaster. Now for the first time the whole story is told in detail by an expert. It is a riveting and tragic political story, a morality tale, and an essential text for understanding todays Africa.

Martin Meredith documents the remarkable life of Bram Fischer in his biography Fischers Choice. Fischer was born into an aristocratic Afrikaans family but became one of South Africas leading revolutionaries. Regarded in his youth as having a brilliant career ahead of him, he rebelled not only against the apartheid system but also against his own Afrikaner people. As a defence lawyer, Fischer managed to save Mandela from the death penalty demanded by state prosecutors for his sabotage activities. He played a remarkable role in the underground movement aimed at overthrowing the government. To the very last, even when all the other conspirators had been arrested or fled into exile, Fischer held out, sought for months by the security police. His single-handed efforts ended inevitably in failure. Sentenced to life imprisonment, he was cast into solitary confinement, the government continued to regard him as a potentially dangerous influence even when he was dying of cancer, refusing all appeals to release him until the last few weeks of his life. Set against the dramatic background of two massive historical struggles, one by the Afrikaans, the other by the Africans, Fischers life contains all the ingredients of a political thriller.

As a narrative of Africa's political trajectory since independence, this book is hard to beat... Elegantly written as well as unerringly accurate' Financial Times'Meredith has given a spectacularly clear view of the African political jungle' Spectator'You cannot even begin to understand contemporary African politics if you have not read this fascinating book' Bob GeldofAfrica is forever on our TV screens, but the bad-news stories (famine, genocide, corruption) massively outweigh the good (South Africa). Ever since the process of de-colonialisation began in the mid-1950s, and arguably before, the continent has appeared to be stuck in a process of irreversible decline. Constant war, improper use of natural resources and misappropriation of revenues and aid monies contribute to an impression of a continent beyond hope.How did we get here? What, if anything, is to be done? Fully revised and updated and weaving together the key stories and characters of the last sixty years into a stunningly compelling and coherent narrative, Martin Meredith has produced the definitive history of how European ideas of how to organise 10,000 different ethnic groups has led to what Tony Blair described as the 'scar on the conscience of the world'. Authoritative, provocative and consistently fascinating, this is the seminal book on one of the most important issues facing the West today.