Book review: "Exterminate All the Brutes: One Man's Odyssey Into the Heart of Darkness and the Origins of European Genocide" by Sven Lindquist

 I know, I'm coming in hot with the feel good book review. But you can't be that surprised right?

I picked up this book because I was watching the HBO "hybrid docuseries" (whatever that means) of the same name. The HBO program was so well done and interesting and even though it's 4 hour long episodes long I've rewatched it several times. The book is one of three works that they base the series off of. The whole program is about basically, genocide. It covers a lot of areas - Native Americans and the establishment of the United States, the terrifying colonial takeovers in Africa, more modern acts of genocide like the Holocaust, Rwanda and the Balkans and slavery all around the world. It is heavy material but I learned so much and it was really beautifully and artistically done. Also, my boy Josh Hartnett is in some of the recreations (which are not cheesy). Anyway, if you have HBO I'd truly recommend it.

Okay, on to the book!

I love the opening sentences: "You already know enough. So do I. It is not the knowledge we lack. What is missing is the courage to understand what we know and to draw conclusions." Ah yes, the scary part - self reflection and change.

So Sven's book focuses on Africa. It's kind of a historical reflection and interspersed with it is his own travels through Africa as a writer - but it's far more historical reflection than travelogue. (Though it's funny to hear him talking about lugging a wordprocessor and tons of floppy disks (amazing! so convenient!) through Africa on buses through the dessert. Another touch point that he uses is the book Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad. Joseph Conrad was ahead of his time when it came to writing stories that DIDN'T glamorize the British colonial era (looking at you Kipling). There were some real life Kurtz figures in history and he talks about them.

It can't be overstated how much the Africans were viewed as non-humans. An example of this in the book is that there was a certain type of bullet that was prohibited in warfare between "civilized states". It could only be used for big game hunting and colonial wars. No shooting other white folks with it but if you want to shoot a lion or an African, fair game. The bullets were designed to break into pieces which lead to infection and festering. If the initial shot didn't kill you immediately it would eventually. 

This book was also the first time that I had heard of the Guanche people. They were the "first people to be destroyed by European expansion".  They were of African origin but lived on what we now call the Canary Islands. There were about 80,000 of them. Then in 1478 Christopher Columbus' patron sent an expedition with guns and horses to the island. By 1483 there were only about 2,000 left. Mostly women, children and the elderly. Almost complete extinction of a people in less than 5 years.

Here's an interesting quote: "(at the time of Columbus' arrival) many scholar's believe that there was roughly an equal number of people in Europe as in America....during the following 300 years the population of the world increased by 250%. Europe's increased fast by around 450% - 500%. The original population of America fell by 90%".