Publisher's Weekly Review
To the African tribes whose lands Cecil Rhodes coveted, he was "Ulodzi," who "eats a country for breakfast." Thomas, one of the producers of a forthcoming Masterpiece Theater dramatization already shown on the BBC in Britain, has produced here the book of the filmed biography of him. If there is a hero, it is the majestic Lobengula, the Matabele king who was, Rhodes believed, "the only block to Central Africa." By force and by deceit, Rhodes acquired the territory, along with access to goldfields and diamond mines. By his middle 30s, he controlled, ostensibly under the British flag, a swath of southern Africa as large as Europe. If his imperial dreams made him super rich while impoverishing the blacks, who were restricted to an apartheid existence by Rhodes as much as by the Afrikaners he tried to co-opt, it was all for flag and country. At 37 he was prime minister of Cape Colony, and on the side he manipulated the world supply of diamonds and a second fortune in gold. When he died in 1902 at 48, he left a legacy of brutality and injusticesanitized, however, by his Rhodes Scholarships to his beloved Oxford University. (He had neither wife nor children, preferring a devoted elite of young men.) Like its many predecessors, Thomas's detailed biography makes the case that Rhodes was not an idealist corrupted by greed but a maker of what little of his myth remains. Illustrations. (Sept.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Booklist Review
When he succumbed to chronic illness in 1902 at the age of 48, Cecil Rhodes was already viewed by many as a demigod of the British Empire. In his 30-year career in Africa, Rhodes added vast territories to the empire, acquired a near monopoly of South African diamond production, and personified for many the spirit of aggressive but "enlightened" imperialism that would "make the world British." Yet, as Thomas indicates, Rhodes' Anglo-Saxon chauvinism and contempt for the capabilities of Africans led directly to the Boer War and the outrages of the apartheid system. Thomas, a native of South Africa, is both attracted to and repulsed by Rhodes. How did the 18-year-old youth who mixed easily with Africans and charmed both the humble and the haughty evolve into a racist and rather narrow-minded chauvinist? In Thomas' view, Rhodes underwent a Macbeth-like transformation as he was seduced by his lust for both wealth and power. Specialists will find valuable information and insights here; the general reader will be captivated by an exciting but deeply flawed man. --Jay Freeman
Library Journal Review
Thomas, a native South African best known as a producer, has also written the six-part Masterpiece Theater series this biography is based on. He takes an evenhanded look at South African politician Rhodes (1853-1902), presenting his charm and intellect but not whitewashing how he used them. Thomas resists the temptation to psychoanalyze Rhodes, briefly discussing such items as Rhodes's sexual orientation and family relationships without dwelling on them. He uses and cites primary sources where possible and mentions where the lack of sources leaves a gap in our understanding of Rhodes; he offers theories as to what might have happened without attempting to prove any of them. The reader is left with an admiration for Rhodes's abilities and a repugnance for the apartheid system he helped create. For public and academic libraries.Julie Still, Rutgers Univ., New Brunswick, N.J. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
