Books by John Hanning Speke
The Discovery of the Source of the Nile
by John Hanning Speke
Speke, a 19th century Victorian explorer, talks about the flat-nosed, flat-lipped negro, on the one hand, and then waxes euphoric about the kind of superior, Aryan-looking Ethiopic types. It’s almost like a zoology about human beings – and it became incredibly influential. It became, in many ways, the underpinning of all the theories that were used by the Belgians to divide Rwanda, when they ruled it as a colony in the 20th century. And it came to influence these Rwandan peasants in the hills as they killed their neighbours in 1994.
Interviews where books by John Hanning Speke were recommended
The best books on The Rwandan Genocide, recommended by Philip Gourevitch
Philip Gourevitch, author of We Wish To Inform You That Tomorrow We Will Be Killed With Our Families, an account of the Rwandan genocide, explores five books on the events that left 800,000 dead in 100 days.
