Mariner King Leopold's Ghost: A Story of Greed, Terror, and Heroism in Colonial Africa

Poucas vezes se encontra um trabalho documental tão profundo, sobre um momento histórico tão decisivo, de forma tão literária — história com gosto de romance, mistura perfeita de entretenimento e informação.

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Book was like new.

In retelling the life of Stanley, I would like to review two books, Frank McLynn's Stanley and Adam Hochschild's King Leopold's Ghost. It was in reading the latter that I discovered the incredible like of Stanley, which led to my ordering the former. Although Hochschild's book is only party about Stanley, it adds important insights that complete McLynn's work. So many things strike one as being incredible in both of these biographies that I hardly know where to start. As a child Stanley was led into an imposing building by his mother who said she would have to enter an adjoining room for a few minutes to take care of some business. She then abandoned her son, leaving him in an English workhouse. Psychologists say that a child's worse nightmare is the fear of being abandoned. I can bear this out personally: at the age of 5 I was `'lost'' in a department story for an hour or so. I can still see myself (my very first memory, one as clearly as day), screaming for all I was worth, until my mother came for me. Stanley (whose name wasn't Stanley then) experienced nightly horrors so terrible that he never was able to react sexually in a normal fashion thereafter--some say he never even consummated (what a word!) his marriage when it finally occurred late in life. He became a sadomasochist, always accompanied by a young boy he could browbeat and humiliate (supposedly nothing more), never caring a damn about who died during his expeditions. He was a liar, lying about everything from his name to where he was born (he insisted he was an American) to when he was born. But then he did incredible feats of exploration that put him squarely in the category of the seafaring Cook, and he found Livingston, supposedly the only man he ever respected.

大国の君主として振舞いたいベルギー王・レオポルド2世は証しとして植民地が欲しかった。時あたかも列強による植民地分割競争が終盤にさしかかっており、焦るレオポルドの前にアフリカ探検で有名なスタンレーが現われる。虚栄心の強烈な二人のでっち上げたのが「コンゴ自由国」、実質的にはレオポルドの私有地という特異な植民地であった。　当初はゴムが収入源だったが、ベルギーの公安軍は原住民の女性、子供、老人を人質にして男たちに樹液集めを強制した。それでも言うことを聞かない村は見せしめのため焼き討ち、皆殺しにしてしまう。白人は現地で徴発した黒人兵に対して武器弾薬を支給するにも、くすねるのではないか、と猜疑心を持っており、一発ごとに証拠を要求した。どんな証拠か？　──殺した相手の右手である。エスカレートして報酬目当てに生きている人間から右手を切り取るなどということも横行した。個別の殺戮ばかりでなく、構造的な収奪システムからもたらされた飢餓や疫病による死者は数え切れないほど膨大な数にのぼる。こうした“文明”という偽善の裏にあった残虐な実態を告発、世論を動かした人々、とりわけエドモンド・モレルやロジャー・ケースメントたちの活躍に焦点が合わされる。ただし、構造的な問題が解消されたわけではなく、例えばモブツの所業はレオポルドと全く同じであったことも指摘される。　アフリカ問題や植民地問題で本書はよく言及される割に日本語訳はない。人物群像などもきちんと描きこまれて歴史ノンフィクションとして読み応え十分だと思うのだが。アフリカ問題の本は日本ではやはり縁遠いか。