The Shadow of the Sun: My African Life by Ryszard Kapuscinski (Paperback, 2002)

'Only with the greatest of simplifications for the sake of convenience can we say Africa In reality except as a geographical term Africa doesn't exist' Ryszard Kapuscinski has been writing about the people of Africa throughout his career In astudy that avoids the official routes palaces and big politics he sets out to create an account of post-colonial Africa seen at once as a whole and as a location that wholly defies generalised explanations It is both a sustained meditation on themosaic of peoples and practises we call 'Africa' and an impassioned attempt to come to terms with humanity itself as it struggles to escape from foreign domination from the intoxications of freedom from war and from politics as theft