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A review by beautyistruth
The Shadow of the Sun by Ryszard Kapuściński
3.0
(More of a note than a real review)
As always with Kapuscinski's books, the writing is fantastic, and the narrative gripping. But something didn't seem right about it to me, for books purporting to be factual accounts... My belief was being increasingly suspended and I was suspicious.. I increasingly felt like this must be the work of a fantasist, or a hybrid at least: a hybrid of fantasy and travelogue.
I did a little research and very quickly it turned out that other people suspect the same. A contemporary who knew Kapuscinski wrote a biography and his research could not confirm many of Kapuscinski's factual claims: for example some of the people Kapuscinski claimed to have known, to have met. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/media/press/ryszard-kapuscinski-he-was-hailed-as-the-greatest-reporter-of-his-time-but-how-much-did-he-make-up-1914287.html
If this is the case, Kapuscinski would definitely not be the only journalist to have made things up: recently there was a scandal about a German Der Spiegel journalist, Claas Relotius, who was found to have invented things 'on a grand scale' for many years. https://www.spiegel.de/international/zeitgeist/claas-relotius-reporter-forgery-scandal-a-1244755.html
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It's hard to know how to review such books and I have gone with the idea of viewing them as literature, glory-seeking, and even as... polemics alongside. Yes, because Kapuscinski is making political and cultural arguments for sure. But certainly it is disconcerting and I think that it would be good to suspend your belief about some of the things Kapuscinski claims as factual accounts.
While I already knew this, it's another good reminder that journalism is often extremely biased - at worst to the point of actually making things up to make for good journalism.
As always with Kapuscinski's books, the writing is fantastic, and the narrative gripping. But something didn't seem right about it to me, for books purporting to be factual accounts... My belief was being increasingly suspended and I was suspicious.. I increasingly felt like this must be the work of a fantasist, or a hybrid at least: a hybrid of fantasy and travelogue.
I did a little research and very quickly it turned out that other people suspect the same. A contemporary who knew Kapuscinski wrote a biography and his research could not confirm many of Kapuscinski's factual claims: for example some of the people Kapuscinski claimed to have known, to have met. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/media/press/ryszard-kapuscinski-he-was-hailed-as-the-greatest-reporter-of-his-time-but-how-much-did-he-make-up-1914287.html
If this is the case, Kapuscinski would definitely not be the only journalist to have made things up: recently there was a scandal about a German Der Spiegel journalist, Claas Relotius, who was found to have invented things 'on a grand scale' for many years. https://www.spiegel.de/international/zeitgeist/claas-relotius-reporter-forgery-scandal-a-1244755.html
--------------
It's hard to know how to review such books and I have gone with the idea of viewing them as literature, glory-seeking, and even as... polemics alongside. Yes, because Kapuscinski is making political and cultural arguments for sure. But certainly it is disconcerting and I think that it would be good to suspend your belief about some of the things Kapuscinski claims as factual accounts.
While I already knew this, it's another good reminder that journalism is often extremely biased - at worst to the point of actually making things up to make for good journalism.