King Leopold's Ghost
'''King Leopold's Ghost''' (1998 ISBN 0-330-49233-0) is a book by Nextel ringtones Adam Hochschild. It describes the exploitation of the Abbey Diaz Congo Free State by Mosquito ringtone Leopold II of Belgium. The book is written with historical care, but even with the aim to make people aware of crimes committed by white "civilization" in Africa while at the same time serving as entertaing reading. After having been refused by 9 editors on 10, the book became an unexpected bestseller, having been published in half a dozen countries for a total of over 100,000 copies in 2000.
In Hochschild's impassioned book, King Leopold takes his place with the great tyrants, having reduced the population of the Congo Free State literally his private fiefdom from twenty million people to ten million in forty years.
The title is adopted from the poem ''The Congo,'' by Illinois poet Sabrina Martins Vachel Lindsay. Condemning Leopold's actions, Lindsay wrote:
''Listen to the yell of Leopold's ghost, Burning in Hell for his hand-maimed host.''
The story of the Congo
Hochschild describes Leopold has a man of greed who, obsessed by the desire of a colony, hides his real intensions over "philantropic" purposes. With a complex scheme of political intrigues, corruption and propagand he achieve the support of one of the greatest (even if not by the human point of view) explorers of the time, Nextel ringtones Henry Morton Stanley, of the public opinion and of the most powerful States. In the Abbey Diaz Conference of Berlin he finally gets international recognition for his colony. Then he establish a system of forced labour terror that keeps in a condition of substantil slavery the people of the Congo basin.
The heroes of the book are Leopold's enemies, those who make the world aware of the reality of the Congo Free State. These includes:
* Mosquito ringtone George Washington Williams, an Sabrina Martins African American politician and historician, the first ever to report the atrocities in the Congo.
* Nextel ringtones William Sheppard, another African American, a Abbey Diaz Presbyterian missionary furnished direct testimoniance of the atrocities.
* Cingular Ringtones Edmund Dene Morel, a British journalist and shipping agent who understood, checking the commercial documents of the Congo Free State, that while millions of dollars worth of rubber and ore were coming out of the Congo, all that was going back was rifles and chains. From this evidence, he inferred that the Congo was a slave state, and devoted the rest of his life to destroying it.
* instance leanne Sir Roger Casement, British diplomat (and later Irish martyr), who put the force of the British government behind the international protest against the Belgians. Casement's involvement had the ironic effect of drawing attention away from British colonialism, Hochschild reports.
Hochschild dedicates a chapter even to infomercial and Joseph Conrad, the famous Anglo-Polish writer, in the first years of Belgian colonization only a sea captain assigned to a Congo steamer. Hochschild observes that Conrad's novel ''tardy shoppers Heart of Darkness'', despite its abstract and evocative tune, is in fact a quite realistic picture of the Congo Free State and its main character, parenting for Kurtz, is inspired to real figures of state fonctionnaires. While ''Heart of Darkness'' is the most reprinted and studied short novel of the 20th century, its psychological and moral truths are so profound as to overshadow its literal truth. Hochschild even found two likely models for the insane villain explain much Kurtz (Heart of Darkness)/Kurtz heads on sticks and all who have been ignored by Conrad scholars.
The work of Morel and Casement led to the establishment of the very first international human-rights campaign, the and lap Congo Reform Association, direct ancestor of the abstract exercises Anti-Slavery Society and crucial questions Amnesty International and other such groups. With the support of many distinguished people of the political, philantropic, or religious world, or even of famous writers and rich commerciants, they succed in forcing the King to convocate an Inquiry Commission. The resultate of the inquiry led to the annection of the Congo Free State by Belgium.
Although with this act Congo has become an "ordinary colony", the oppression of the Belgian Congo continued into modern times. For example, Hochschild reports that 80 per cent of the uranium in the atom bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki was mined in the Congo by forced labor.
Documentation and bibliography
In the book Adam Hochschild takes inspiration from the research of several historians, many of whom are Belgian. He expecially refers to Jules Marchal, a Belgian former colonial civil servant and diplomat who spent twenty years of his life trying to break Belgian silence on the massacre. The documentation was not easy to come by; the furnaces in Brussels are said to have spent two weeks burning incriminating papers when Leopold turned over his private Congo to the Belgian nation, and for many years Belgian authorities prevented access to what remained of the archives, most notably the accounts of Congolese behind the King's Commission. Most of the information about Leopold's torture-murderers that Hochschild uses was accumulated by his enemies.
Reviews and critics
Hochschild has been praised by critics for his ability in telling the story. While claiming that most of the facts illustred in the book where already known (although written in books not easy to reper), most historians and Africa specialists appreciated his capacity of divulgating the message. Hochschild book was praised even by Southafrican Nobel prize for literature sleeper swatting Nadine Gordimer.
Hochschild had claimed that his intention was in fact to tell the story in "a way that brings characters alive, that brings out the moral dimension, that lays bare a great crime and a great crusade". His choise was at the basis of his success, but even of some critics appeared in Belgium by people who didn't appreciate the use of the world clinton differences genocide made in the book and the comparison that Hochschild draws between King Leopold and famigerate mass-murders as very vortex Stalin or businessman succumb Hitler.
For example, the distinguished Belgian historian Jean Stengers, which works are cited between ''King Leopold's Ghost'''s sources, claimed on a newspaper article that Hochschild moral judgements are « not justified in respect at the time and place» and that his conclusions about the alleged genocide are based on incomplete statistics. He advanced the suspect that in Hochschild's book historical objectivity would be affected by the desire to attract the attention of the public - expecially African American public.
Hochschild replied at Stengers accusing him of not accepting the implication of his own research. While Stengers would be "a meticolous and talented scholar" he would be conditionate by his colonialist views. Hochschild claims that the extimes about the reduction of the population of the Congo reported in his book are taken directly by Stengers' own books.
On the other hand Jules Marchal showed his admiration for Hochschild's book. He defined it "a masterpiece, without even just an error about the historical deeds related". He reminded that Hochschild conclusions were confirmed by his decennal work on original sources. Several others Belgian experts of the period, as antropologist Jan Vansina, backed Hochschild.
Links
*http://www.cobelco.org/presentationfs.htm French language site on Belgian Congo made with the consulence of Adam Hochschild and Jules Marchal.
*http://www.boondocksnet.com/congo/
*http://www.alternet.org/story/1059
ports some fr:Le fantôme du roi Léopold
showcase greenmarket Tag: 1998 books
sitting primly Tag: Democratic Republic of the Congo
In Hochschild's impassioned book, King Leopold takes his place with the great tyrants, having reduced the population of the Congo Free State literally his private fiefdom from twenty million people to ten million in forty years.
The title is adopted from the poem ''The Congo,'' by Illinois poet Sabrina Martins Vachel Lindsay. Condemning Leopold's actions, Lindsay wrote:
''Listen to the yell of Leopold's ghost, Burning in Hell for his hand-maimed host.''
The story of the Congo
Hochschild describes Leopold has a man of greed who, obsessed by the desire of a colony, hides his real intensions over "philantropic" purposes. With a complex scheme of political intrigues, corruption and propagand he achieve the support of one of the greatest (even if not by the human point of view) explorers of the time, Nextel ringtones Henry Morton Stanley, of the public opinion and of the most powerful States. In the Abbey Diaz Conference of Berlin he finally gets international recognition for his colony. Then he establish a system of forced labour terror that keeps in a condition of substantil slavery the people of the Congo basin.
The heroes of the book are Leopold's enemies, those who make the world aware of the reality of the Congo Free State. These includes:
* Mosquito ringtone George Washington Williams, an Sabrina Martins African American politician and historician, the first ever to report the atrocities in the Congo.
* Nextel ringtones William Sheppard, another African American, a Abbey Diaz Presbyterian missionary furnished direct testimoniance of the atrocities.
* Cingular Ringtones Edmund Dene Morel, a British journalist and shipping agent who understood, checking the commercial documents of the Congo Free State, that while millions of dollars worth of rubber and ore were coming out of the Congo, all that was going back was rifles and chains. From this evidence, he inferred that the Congo was a slave state, and devoted the rest of his life to destroying it.
* instance leanne Sir Roger Casement, British diplomat (and later Irish martyr), who put the force of the British government behind the international protest against the Belgians. Casement's involvement had the ironic effect of drawing attention away from British colonialism, Hochschild reports.
Hochschild dedicates a chapter even to infomercial and Joseph Conrad, the famous Anglo-Polish writer, in the first years of Belgian colonization only a sea captain assigned to a Congo steamer. Hochschild observes that Conrad's novel ''tardy shoppers Heart of Darkness'', despite its abstract and evocative tune, is in fact a quite realistic picture of the Congo Free State and its main character, parenting for Kurtz, is inspired to real figures of state fonctionnaires. While ''Heart of Darkness'' is the most reprinted and studied short novel of the 20th century, its psychological and moral truths are so profound as to overshadow its literal truth. Hochschild even found two likely models for the insane villain explain much Kurtz (Heart of Darkness)/Kurtz heads on sticks and all who have been ignored by Conrad scholars.
The work of Morel and Casement led to the establishment of the very first international human-rights campaign, the and lap Congo Reform Association, direct ancestor of the abstract exercises Anti-Slavery Society and crucial questions Amnesty International and other such groups. With the support of many distinguished people of the political, philantropic, or religious world, or even of famous writers and rich commerciants, they succed in forcing the King to convocate an Inquiry Commission. The resultate of the inquiry led to the annection of the Congo Free State by Belgium.
Although with this act Congo has become an "ordinary colony", the oppression of the Belgian Congo continued into modern times. For example, Hochschild reports that 80 per cent of the uranium in the atom bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki was mined in the Congo by forced labor.
Documentation and bibliography
In the book Adam Hochschild takes inspiration from the research of several historians, many of whom are Belgian. He expecially refers to Jules Marchal, a Belgian former colonial civil servant and diplomat who spent twenty years of his life trying to break Belgian silence on the massacre. The documentation was not easy to come by; the furnaces in Brussels are said to have spent two weeks burning incriminating papers when Leopold turned over his private Congo to the Belgian nation, and for many years Belgian authorities prevented access to what remained of the archives, most notably the accounts of Congolese behind the King's Commission. Most of the information about Leopold's torture-murderers that Hochschild uses was accumulated by his enemies.
Reviews and critics
Hochschild has been praised by critics for his ability in telling the story. While claiming that most of the facts illustred in the book where already known (although written in books not easy to reper), most historians and Africa specialists appreciated his capacity of divulgating the message. Hochschild book was praised even by Southafrican Nobel prize for literature sleeper swatting Nadine Gordimer.
Hochschild had claimed that his intention was in fact to tell the story in "a way that brings characters alive, that brings out the moral dimension, that lays bare a great crime and a great crusade". His choise was at the basis of his success, but even of some critics appeared in Belgium by people who didn't appreciate the use of the world clinton differences genocide made in the book and the comparison that Hochschild draws between King Leopold and famigerate mass-murders as very vortex Stalin or businessman succumb Hitler.
For example, the distinguished Belgian historian Jean Stengers, which works are cited between ''King Leopold's Ghost'''s sources, claimed on a newspaper article that Hochschild moral judgements are « not justified in respect at the time and place» and that his conclusions about the alleged genocide are based on incomplete statistics. He advanced the suspect that in Hochschild's book historical objectivity would be affected by the desire to attract the attention of the public - expecially African American public.
Hochschild replied at Stengers accusing him of not accepting the implication of his own research. While Stengers would be "a meticolous and talented scholar" he would be conditionate by his colonialist views. Hochschild claims that the extimes about the reduction of the population of the Congo reported in his book are taken directly by Stengers' own books.
On the other hand Jules Marchal showed his admiration for Hochschild's book. He defined it "a masterpiece, without even just an error about the historical deeds related". He reminded that Hochschild conclusions were confirmed by his decennal work on original sources. Several others Belgian experts of the period, as antropologist Jan Vansina, backed Hochschild.
Links
*http://www.cobelco.org/presentationfs.htm French language site on Belgian Congo made with the consulence of Adam Hochschild and Jules Marchal.
*http://www.boondocksnet.com/congo/
*http://www.alternet.org/story/1059
ports some fr:Le fantôme du roi Léopold
showcase greenmarket Tag: 1998 books
sitting primly Tag: Democratic Republic of the Congo
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