I Didn't Do It for You: How the World Betrayed a Small African Nation (P.S.)

I came to this book having loved "In the Footsteps of Mr Kurtz", a fantastic book which veered crazily between the tragic and the hilariously funny in its account of how the Congolese have tried to survive the awfulness which befell their country.

"I didn't do it for you" reads much more like an angry polemic on behalf of the Eritrean people and I liked it less as a result. Its one-sidedness was particularly apparent in the description of the long struggle with Ethiopia for independence where Ms Wrong lionises the EPLF as modern-day Spartans, fantastically brave and resourceful, unswervingly dedicated to their cause - whereas the Ethiopians are never portrayed as anything more than murderous brutes. Her failure to level much criticism at the EPLF makes the post-independence slide of Eritrea into dictatorship and isolation seem a little odd, especially since she rather glosses over this period.

Nevertheless this is a beautifully written book which combines a myriad of personal anecdotes with painstaking historical research. It is well worth reading because it draws attention to a forgotten corner of Africa, and is a sobering reminder of the horrible damage that both of the Cold War superpowers wreaked in the developing world, as well as the enduring legacy of European colonialism.

How outsiders devastate Africa. (6/6 people found this helpful)

Funnily enough,my first knowledge of Eritrea's liberation struggle is mentioned in this book-BBC World Service news items on the war between the EPLF and Ethiopia in the 1980s.
Michela Wrong writes a wonderfully readable book about how outsiders(Italy,the UK,Ethiopia,USA,USSR,even Cuba)interfered in and almost destroyed Eritrea from the late 19th century onwards.The total amorality and cynicism of the outside world towards Eritrea is well documented in the mid-section of the book,roughly from 1974 to 1978,when the superpowers changed sides in the regional conflict in the Horn of Africa-the US swapped Ethiopia for Somalia as allies,and the USSR did the opposite,and the Eritreans,on the verge of a victorious offensive against Ethiopia,were forced to retreat and the war continued till 1991.
Wrong justly points out that other African countries hardly covered themselves with glory during the Ethiopian occupation of Eritrea.Even those states that came to independence throgh liberation wars found the Eritreans an embarrasment,and the OAU(based in Ethiopia's capital)couldn't bring itself to denounce one African country for occupying another.The fear of post-indepeenence boundaries being altered,and potentially every African country's borders being open to revision,was a nightmare Africa's leaders couldn't face.
After victory over Ethiopia,Wrong's depiction of the Eritrean leadership's attitude towards the tyrants,kleptocrats and corrupt incompetents who made up most of Africa's leadership cadre in the early 1990s is very well done.Also well done is the story of how the arrogance of Eritrea's new leaders led them into a disastrous war with Ethiopia(what,again?)in the late 1990s.This also led to the hope of a homegrown democracy in Africa giving way to an increasingly authoritarian government within Eritrea.
Wrong correctly points out that,post-independence,most outsiders romanticised Eritrea as a possibility of an African country following a path of good governance and respect for human rights,rather than as the messy outcome of decades of war and internal struggle.The war with Ethiopia and the internal clampdown caused such disappointment amongst western well-wishers because it led to the smashing of their own illusions about Eritrea.
The heroes of this book are the ordinary Eritrean men and women who endured so much in the independence war,only for independence to lead to yet more war and repression,this time from their own government.Wrong correctly salutes their feats,but seems to try too hard to look for a silver lining and a happy ending.She obviously knows more about Eritrea than I do, but I can't be so optimistic.
In short,a great,readable book about a part of the world that is,despite the constant meddling of the outside world,largely unknown in Europe.

A fabulous African journey (16/18 people found this helpful)

This is an extraordinary, many-layered book and I challenge anyone to remain unmoved by its epic tale. I began it ignorant about one of Africa's least known countries, and ended it enraged, inspired ... and much wiser, not only about Eritrea but about the West's grotesque use of African statelets as political footballs.

The book is an impassioned travelogue through landscape, history and politics, with an author at once caustically funny, thoughtful and wry. If you like intelligent travel writing, you will love ms wrong's work, with its vivid landscapes and incisive human portraits. A cast of characters at times Pythonesque move against a back-cloth of tragedy - like the Italian Victor Meldrew, who sits, cursing in his rusting Eritrean scrapyard, or the bored GIs who hold farting competitions and smear their pants with peanut butter to horrify fastidious locals.

Underlying it all is the author's meticulous research, but it is a tribute to her writing that the reader never notices that they are being educated as well as entertained. I finished the book with that feeling of regret that only exceptional works give you.

Eritrea explained - brilliantly! (15/18 people found this helpful)

For any reader who took pleasure in reading Ms Wrong's first book, it was difficult to believe that In the Footsteps of Mr Kurtz could be bettered. How? Having now read I Didn't Do It For You, I can safely say that I could not have been more wrong (if you will excuse the pun!). Few chroniclers of African history have been as thorough in their research, as objective in their analysis and as compelling in their style. History books tend to be difficult to read. Most non-scholarly types read them because they have to, not because they want to. Not so with I Didn't Do It For You. It is page-turningly riveting. Ms Wrong has not just done it again but surpassed herself.

Eritrea is not a country which instantly grabs the imagination. One picks up Ms Wrong's book with a degree of curiosity. Why Eritrea? But as the story unfolds and one learns of the designs of Ferdinando Martini, the ghastly battle of Keren, the ridiculously grandiloquent Lion of Judah, the dreadful Super Power ding-dong wars and the crying shame of the last few years, one's heart bleeds for that benighted country. In Ms Wrong's words "Poor Eritrea."

This book is essential reading for anyone who is serious about understanding Africa's past and its bearing on the present. Eritrea is a superb example of the fall-out of the infamous Berlin Conference. Nobody before Ms Wrong has been dogged enough to do the research into this complicated story. She has courage and intelligence which she employs to superb effect. I salute her.

A wakeup call (16/25 people found this helpful)

I am very much impressed by the details that went into the book. I am an Eritrean, and being one was never easy. I can confidently say that is what I read in this book - the difficulty my fellow countrymen, especially the freedom fighters, sustained over the years. One can sum up the Eritrean experience with its abnormal nature. The author managed to describe that successfully.

Now Eritrea is supposed to be a free country and one would think that all that history of successive colonial eras plus the American and Soviet intrusions is behind it. Well, not really. Sadly enough, Eritrea is still going through serious difficulties.

Although re-visiting the past was not easy, I remained fixated from start to finish. And at times I got emotional.

I Didn't Do It for You: How the World Betrayed a Small African Nation (P.S.)

Michela Wrong

Reader Reviews:

Beautifully written and researched, but very one-sided (1/1 people found this helpful)

How outsiders devastate Africa. (6/6 people found this helpful)

A fabulous African journey (16/18 people found this helpful)

Eritrea explained - brilliantly! (15/18 people found this helpful)

A wakeup call (16/25 people found this helpful)

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