Africa Books

The Great Escape: Background and Memoirs of the Liberian Civil War well written documentary...allows the reader to feel as if s/he is seeing the events first hand.

This book was wonderfully written and really helped me to better understand the horrible, terrifying, inhumane conditions that the people of Liberia (as well as other countries in Africa) have been dealing with over the past decades. I found my heart racing at certain points, and what made it 10x worse was that it is based on *real* events, it's not fiction! I didn't know too much about the civil wars in Africa until I read this and I will be researching some more books to continue my quest for understanding and perhaps finding more solutions to help make Africa the proud nation it is meant to be! Thank you to Dorothy Johnson for taking the time to put her thoughts onto paper and sharing her faith in God with the world!

This is a truly outstanding book for South African Aloe enthusiasts of any level from beginner to expert. The authors recognized an obvious vacuum in the literature on growing, collecting, and conserving South African Aloes, and this work deftly bridges the gap between peer reviewed botanical journals and elementary field guides. The book brings together information on plant characteristics, distribution, habitat, cultivation, uses, name etymology, and endangered status. Each species description occupies 2 facing pages with textual content on the left and 1 or more excellent photos of plants in habitat on the right. The content, format, and style harmonize to make this book hard to lay down. It is well worth its modest ...price. Highly recommended.

A good book for both beginner and expert. It puts the aloes in 10 groups, from Tree Aloes to Grass Aloes with detailed desciptions of most aloes. It does not, however, have aloes from anywhere but South africa...but that is the only falt I can find with it.

Like other reviewers here, I picked up this book because I enjoyed his first two books, but unlike those books which were more like textbooks, this book does a real good job explaining the story of the Punic Wars. Once again, the book comes with great tactical maps and regional maps, and this one also has a bunch of glossaries that help keep all of the Roman and Carthaginian names straight. It was easy to picture the battles and the slaughter from the book's descriptions. This is another fine book!

I purchased this book because of a life-long love affair with the Punic Wars and the amazing personalities involved. Carey does a superb job giving his readers an overview of the First Punic War and the Carthaginian and Roman military machines involved. He then delves into reconstructing the Second Punic War, paying special attention to the strategy and tactics employed by both the Romans and Carthaginians in this conflict at land and at sea. Individual chapters are dedicated to the early campaigns of Hannibal Barca and Scipio Africanus leading up to an exhaustive treatment of the battle of Zama and its implications to Western Civilization. Carey then follows the careers of thse two commanders post Zama and ends the book with a treatment of the third and final Punic War. The tactical maps are outstanding, and the book comes with a chronology of the Punic Wars, as well as numerous glossaries on Roman and Carthaginians political and military terms. This is a short book and a fine survey of the wars that gave Rome mastery of the western Mediterranean.

You can get ready for World Cup 2010 in South Africa by reading this book, and if for some reason, it is played somewhere else, it is still worthwhile reading. It should be reprinted.

I saw a list on the 50 best books on soccer to read from the magazine Four Four Two; and this one certainly belongs on that list. It wasn't there, but it was better than some I read that were on the list and that list is subjective anyway; as you read on what interests you; if you are interested in Africa; you'll gobble this book right up!

Peter Auf Der Heyde, the author really loves his subject; grew up in South Africa; both with Apartheid and with out it. He played goalkeeper for black teams in South Africa and is a journalist with a unique perspective. I'd read about anything by him; he is an encyclopedia on African soccer (which by the way, he calls someone else that in the book).

We read about his journeys to World Cup and African Nations Cup qualifiers as well, as viewing games at the World Cup and at the Cup of African Nations. Besides that, we read his coverage of the South African bid to hold the World Cup in 2006; which obviously failed, so the next time, was there time.

He travels the continent to see these games and of course, in one chapter, he was off to France to see the World Cup.

We learn about Muti (seems to be what black magic would be in South Africa) and Voodoo being used in soccer games in Africa, the amiable and pleasant nature of the players from there, about problems that had happened in stadiums that caused disasters, even the common subject in soccer about corruption in it's adminstration and associations among many topics and many countries.

Early in the book, we find out about the Football (read Soccer) Associations in South Africa, Auf Der Heyde's homebase country and a bit of the way it was during Apartheid and afterwards. This goes into quite a bit of detail; but it doesn't last long and is important. After that, this is an exceptional book, to read at night about faraway places and exotic locales. If Auf Der Heyde ever rights a sequel; I think, the only thing, Auf Der Heyde did not cover is the question there is about some African's birthdates in soccer. I'm sure he could tell us a lot about this. He is so knowledgeable in this field; I think, I could chat with him on African football (soccer) for hours.

There are a number of pages of photos which are in color. Quite a few of the pictures are noteworthy, including one of the author with Nelson Mandela.

If one enjoys this book, the movie on South Africa; Catch a fire I would recommend as well.

A joy to read both for the African and the football observations. Totally off the beaten path, and better for it.

An excellent collection of short fiction. Each tale is as compelling, as it is entertaining. Conrad is one of the best short story writers ever he is like a darker Stevenson who delves into the human psyche.

I read this book for a graduate Humanities course. Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness, written in 1899 is a seminal work about the ills of colonialism, as well as a postmodern look at the subject of mankind. Conrad's book had a crucial influence on five important works of the twentieth century: J. G. Frazier's book The Golden Bough. Jessie L. Weston's book From Ritual to Romance, T. S. Elliott's poem the Waste Land, Joseph Campbell's Hero with a Thousand Faces, and Francis Ford Coppolla's movie Apocalypse Now, screenplay by John Milius, was based on Conrad's book. Another interesting fact is that this work was read by Orson Welle's Mercury Theater Players on the radio and was to be his first movie. After doing some work on it he abandoned the project to do Citizen Kane! I would have loved to of seen what Welles could have done with this story. Conrad's story is so riveting in part, because he himself served as a riverboat captain. High school teachers and college professors who have discussed this book in thousands of classrooms over the years tend to do so in terms of Freud, Jung, and Nietzsche; of classical myth, Victorian innocence, and original sin; of postmodernism, postcolonialism, and poststructuralism.

Just a taste of the plot reels you in! Marlow, the narrator of Heart of Darkness and Conrad's alter ego, is hired by an ivory-trading company to sail a steamboat up an unnamed river whose shape on the map resembles "an immense snake uncoiled, with its head in the sea, its body at rest curving afar over a vast country and its tail lost in the depths of the land" (8). His destination is a post where the company's brilliant, ambitious star agent, Mr. Kurtz, is stationed. Kurtz has collected legendary quantities of ivory, but, Marlow learns along the way, is also rumored to have sunk into unspecified savagery. Marlow's steamer survives an attack by blacks and picks up a load of ivory and the ill Kurtz; Kurtz, talking of his grandiose plans, dies on board as they travel, downstream.

Sketched with only a few bold strokes, Kurtz's image has nonetheless remained in the memories of millions of readers: the lone white agent far up the great river, with his dreams of grandeur,his great store of precious ivory, and his fiefdom carved out of the African jungle. Perhaps more than anything, we remember Marlow, on the steamboat, looking through binoculars at what he thinks are ornamental knobs atop the fence posts in front of Kurtz's house and then finding that each is "black, dried, sunken, with closed eyelids-a head that seemed to sleep at the top of that pole, and with the shrunken dry lips showing a narrow white line of the teeth" (57).

I especially became interested in Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness from the movie Apocalypse Now. There is a scene in the movie that shows Colonel Kurtz's nightstand in his cave. T. S. Elliott's poem the Waste Land is one of three books on the nightstand. The other two are Jessie L. Weston's book From Ritual to Romance, and J. G. Frazier's book The Golden Bough. Anyone wanting to understand the movie Apocalypse Now, especially the character of Colonel Kurtz, and what Milius and Copolla are trying to tell their audience need to read these three books as well as Conrad's Heart of Darkness!

As a graduate student reading in philosophy and history I recommend this book for anyone interested in literature, myth, history, philosophy, religion and fans of Apocalypse Now.

This book combines the full text of Conrad's "Heart of Darkness" with critical notes. There's no need to work with a separate study guide, which makes this read a seamless study of this classic work of literature. Highly recommended.

I read this book for a graduate Humanities course. Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness, written in 1899 is a seminal work about the ills of colonialism, as well as a postmodern look at the subject of mankind. Conrad's book had a crucial influence on five important works of the twentieth century: J. G. Frazier's book The Golden Bough. Jessie L. Weston's book From Ritual to Romance, T. S. Elliott's poem the Waste Land, Joseph Campbell's Hero with a Thousand Faces, and Francis Ford Coppolla's movie Apocalypse Now, screenplay by John Milius, was based on Conrad's book. Another interesting fact is that this work was read by Orson Welle's Mercury Theater Players on the radio and was to be his first movie. After doing some work on it he abandoned the project to do Citizen Kane! I would have loved to of seen what Welles could have done with this story. Conrad's story is so riveting in part, because he himself served as a riverboat captain. High school teachers and college professors who have discussed this book in thousands of classrooms over the years tend to do so in terms of Freud, Jung, and Nietzsche; of classical myth, Victorian innocence, and original sin; of postmodernism, postcolonialism, and poststructuralism.

Just a taste of the plot reels you in! Marlow, the narrator of Heart of Darkness and Conrad's alter ego, is hired by an ivory-trading company to sail a steamboat up an unnamed river whose shape on the map resembles "an immense snake uncoiled, with its head in the sea, its body at rest curving afar over a vast country and its tail lost in the depths of the land" (8). His destination is a post where the company's brilliant, ambitious star agent, Mr. Kurtz, is stationed. Kurtz has collected legendary quantities of ivory, but, Marlow learns along the way, is also rumored to have sunk into unspecified savagery. Marlow's steamer survives an attack by blacks and picks up a load of ivory and the ill Kurtz; Kurtz, talking of his grandiose plans, dies on board as they travel, downstream.

Sketched with only a few bold strokes, Kurtz's image has nonetheless remained in the memories of millions of readers: the lone white agent far up the great river, with his dreams of grandeur,his great store of precious ivory, and his fiefdom carved out of the African jungle. Perhaps more than anything, we remember Marlow, on the steamboat, looking through binoculars at what he thinks are ornamental knobs atop the fence posts in front of Kurtz's house and then finding that each is "black, dried, sunken, with closed eyelids-a head that seemed to sleep at the top of that pole, and with the shrunken dry lips showing a narrow white line of the teeth" (57).

I especially became interested in Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness from the movie Apocalypse Now. There is a scene in the movie that shows Colonel Kurtz's nightstand in his cave. T. S. Elliott's poem the Waste Land is one of three books on the nightstand. The other two are Jessie L. Weston's book From Ritual to Romance, and J. G. Frazier's book The Golden Bough. Anyone wanting to understand the movie Apocalypse Now, especially the character of Colonel Kurtz, and what Milius and Copolla are trying to tell their audience need to read these three books as well as Conrad's Heart of Darkness!

As a graduate student reading in philosophy and history I recommend this book for anyone interested in literature, myth, history, philosophy, religion and fans of Apocalypse Now.

This book is a goldmine of information that uncovers Hebrewisms in African rituals and history all over Africa. It is also connected with some very recent research by antoher Amazon.com writer, Dr. Linda Thomas of Garrett Evangelical Theological Seminary. As an anthropologist/theologian, she studied water purification rituals among Africans in Uguleto, South Africa. These rituals are very close to those in the Old Testament. The content in Dr. Williams' book further connects these types of rituals as they occur throughout the continent Africa. It is an amazing breakthrough in research.

I have used the contents of this book in many interesting ways. Just the other day, I was talking with an 80-year old woman at church, whose mother came from Madagascar, as a slave. I was able to share with her some of the information in the book about the Hebrewisms found in the Africans of Madagascar (some of whom were brought to South Africa as slaves by the Dutch). I was able to tell her that it may be possible that her ancestors might have descended from the ancient Black Jews of Canaan, who migrated down through Africa at various points in their history, and whose Jewish rituals were discovered by various historians at various periods. She is an African American. This is not the first time that I have presented this information in order to establish the fact that Jesus Christ, and the Jews of the Old Testament in many ways, were ancestors of the Africans who were brought here, from all over the continent of Africa as slaves.

It should be in the collection of every researcher into the history of Africans on the continent and throughout the Diaspora.

For several years I had been trying to find some books of valid and substantial merit dealing with Jews who had made their way into West Africa. Often there are books written on the topic that essentially prove nothing or do not provide sources for their assertions. Hebrewisms of West Africa is far different, especially since it was written in the 1930's. Truly, this books is a very good collection of various accounts of people who professed to believe that various ethnic groups in Africa were of mixed African, Semitic, and Israelite ancestry. I was also able to get a 1931 first edition copy of the book, which I treasure.

Many of the accounts center around a question of whether the Ashanti are of Israelite ancestry. Though today this may be questionable since from what I understand the Ashanti don't assert such a claim of themselves. The book covers a number of sources from various explorers and authors who had been either searching or writing on the issue of possible Jewish traces in West Africa. On a side note though a friend of mine asked an Ashanti scholar if they had Jewish ancestry and the scholar avowed that the Ashanti have never circumcised.

This book really helps my research in this area. It is interesting that once I got this book, other sources started to open up to me, and to think this book was published in 1931! How has this book been overlooked for so long? More than likely it is due to the fact that there no longer exists a continuous Jewish presence out of West Africa. It is good that the book also pushes forth the hope that future scholarship will further the topic of Jewish migrations into Africa.

The book also does not go down the path of claiming that all Africans are Hebrews or Israelites, and does not get into a racist flare either. (since it was written iin 1930's before any of the Hebrew Israelite movements had picked up steam). This book goes down the path that some Africans are of a mix of African and Jewish ancestry, and others could be of earlier mixes with Semitic peoples. The conclusion is very interesting also.

I would highly recommend this book to anyone who is seriously researching this subject of early accounts of Semitic peoples and Jews in Africa.

another collectors item for africa lovers and people,still phots of a africa who was unspoilt of tourist in those days

The collaborative effort of Isolde Brielmaier (Visiting Professor of Art at Vassar College) and Ed Marquand (Director of the Hector Acebes Archive), Hector Acebes: Portraits In Africa, 1948-1953 showcases the photography of Acebes taken in Africa in 1948, 1949, and 1953. These black and white photographic images have justifiably been acclaimed as some of the most beautiful photographs of Africans ever taken. The images, however, were hidden away in Acebes' photography studio in Bogota, Columbia, and it was not until 2003 (when Acebes was 82 years old) that he had his first art gallery exhibition. With the publication of Hector Acebes: Portraits In Africa, 1948-1953, (which is enthusiastically recommended for personal, academic, and community library Photography Studies collections) full justice has now been accomplished with respect to bringing a lasting access to Acebes's photographic artistry to the general public.

In the style of "The House That Jack Built", this book employs delightful repetitions and stunning illustrations to give children a picture of the animals who inhabit the African savanna. I read this book on a regular basis to children of all ages (and lots of adults), and they all enjoy it. In fact, I have worn out my initial copy, and have had to order another!

This is a wonderful example of a circular story with excellent repeated lines and incredible pictures. It shows the connections of the various animals and plants of the Savanna.

A must for teachers and parents!

Dr. Asante moves swiftly and confidently to lay out a new history of Africa ,(almost) free of the Eurocentric distortions, race- based assertions and Hegelian dogma that veiwed African people as being outside of human history .
I say "almost" because even Dr. Asante seems reluctant to step all the way out of the European intellectual framework when he state that Dr. Obenga only "challenged" the deeply flawed classification of African languages by Greenberg( see Appendix3 Major Linguistic Complexes).
Obenga gives Greenberg his due but goes on to demolish his "Hamitic-Semitic" and so-called "Afro-Asiatic" classifications: " Ainsi, le "chamito-semitique" ou " afro-asiatique" n'existe pas dans la materialitie des faits linguistiques. C'est une illusion, un mythe." pp 96, Origin Commune De L'Egyptien Ancien Du Copte...L'Harmattan,1993.(Thus, the "Hamitic/Semitic" nor the "Afro-Asiatic" has any factual basis
in linguistics. It is an illusion, a myth.(My translation)
Greenbergs's classification of African
languages supports the Eurocentric paradigm by classifying the language
of KMT in the same family as Arabic, Hebrew,Berber, Akkadian, etc... I
urge Dr. Asante to put the nail in the coffin. As Obenga has written and
demonstrated time and time again: no competent linguist can demonstrate
that the language of the ancient Egyptians, Kemetou is genetically related to Semitic languages!! It can not be done! The language spoken by the ancient Africans who lived in "ancient Egypt" was an African language.
Dr. Asante's book is a wonderful example of modern African historical insights and a fresh new provocative historiography, free of deliberate Euro-centric distortions and out dated Hegelian dogma. Loaded with information!!

THIS IS AN OUTSTANDING BOOK BY AN OUTSTANDING SCHOLAR. IT'S AN INDISPENSABLE GUIDE FOR EVERY STUDENT, TEACHER, SCHOLAR, OR ANY PERSON INTERESTED IN TRUE AFRICAN HISTORY. IF YOU DON'T HAVE IT YET GO GET IT!