The experience of lockdown is starting to feel a lot like being under house arrest. In the UK, you can get out to walk your dog and stock up on booze, but in SA you do not have these privileges. Simon Lincoln Reader, a London-based Saffer who is incredibly well read and knowledgeable on a vast array of topics, has put together a list of must-reads for anyone looking to cheer themselves up while they sit on their couches in isolation. His list includes books on crime, sport and some intriguing entries on state capture in Britain and a work that links him to an amateurish assassin who failed to kill Hendrik Verwoerd. – Jackie Cameron
By Simon Lincoln Reader*
To the best of my knowledge, nobody has achieved or learned anything (aside from fake news) by watching e-tv’s Nikolaus Bauer – or reading any of Iqbal Surve’s op-eds in any of his (sort of) newspapers. So with both the UK and SA now on lockdown, here are ten books on ten subjects worth reading, which have (in my view), the potential to enlighten during these dark days of enforced idleness.
Financial Crime:Â Billion Dollar Whale by Tom Wright and Bradley Hope
Just before Wuhan was declared COVID-19 Ground Zero, a rumour circulated on message boards claiming the fugitive Low Taek Jho, or Jho Low, had been spotted wandering around the city. This delighted conspiracy theorists.
The mastermind of Malaysia’s 1MBD scandal – a fit of sleaze and theft that makes the nine wasted years look amateurish – was for a long time only notable due to the mount of sweat he produced in nightclubs. By all accounts he was just another young Business School shithead – until he encountered the step-son of the Malaysian Prime Minister.
Wright and Hope have produced the definitive chronicle of the looted billions. Worth complimenting the book with Netflix’s Dirty Money. Episode 2, “The Man at the top,’ which examines the political dimensions.
Political Intrigue:Â Two Weeks in November by Douglas Rogers
Rogers is an enormously popular writer, thanks to an accessible style and that enviable white Zimbabwean good-naturedness. His debut, The Last Resort, is equally compelling.
Travel:Â Around the World in 80 Cigars (The Travels of an Epicure) by Nick Hammond
Colourful, humorous and easy – just such a delight to read. The chapter “Great White Shark” is particularly entertaining. Always nice to witness an Englishman being terrified.
Climate: Watermelons (How Environments are Killing the Planet, Destroying the Economy and Stealing Your Children’s Future) by James Delingpole
In 2011, Delingpole broke the Climategate scandal. From that moment he was set upon by a man called Bob Ward, who has the reputation of being one of the most unpleasant men in Britain.
Ward works as spokesperson for the Grantham Institute at the London School of Economics, from where he bullies journalists and editors the length of the land who dare scrutinise radical climate orthodoxy. It is because of the existence of men such as Ward why we can no longer apply critical analysis to the climate discussion.
Meticulously researched and beautifully written, Delingpole makes a number of awkward findings about the climate movement and its supporting dogma. Perhaps Bob Ward would today care to glance out the window to see how well the statement “climate change is the greatest threat to this generation” has aged.
UK State Capture:Â Legacy (Gangsters, Corruption and the London Olympics) by Michael Gillard
This is a story to rival the Mbombela Municipality assassinations in the run up to the FIFA World Cup 2010. It is a book for those who believe that the British are too civilised to entertain industrial graft or extortion. The behaviour of one David Hunt, who unsuccessfully tried to sue the Sunday Times for describing him as a underworld king, could be straight out of Bedfordview 2013.
Sport:Â The 15th Club by Hannes Wessels and Nick Price
Wessels is one of South Africa’s most underrated writers.
A former professional hunter who was almost ended by a wounded Buffalo, the Darling resident’s work is more popular outside South Africa. That’s not particularly surprising: Wessels writes about real men, and real courage, and he does so amidst obsessions with safe spaces, statues, pronouns and male pregnancy. Co-written with champion Zimbabwean golfer Nick Price, the book is dedicated to the late Simon Hobday.
Biography:Â Ramaphosa (The Path to Presidential Power) by Anthony Butler
Few countries presently have as much faith in their premier as South Africans currently do in Cyril Ramaphosa. His potential is being realised at the point where it is most needed; whilst questions remain as to how he’ll survive the sustained onslaughts from the Public Protector, hopeless as they many appear, and other considerable challenges, Butler’s book shapes itself around the best of Ramaphosa, the man who speaks to and for a country.
(*Suggestion: purchase the updated edition). The audio biography of Cyril Ramaphosa is available on Biznews.
Tragedy:Â Paper Tiger (Iqbal Surve and the downfall of Independent Newspapers) by Alide Dasnois and Chris Whitfield
I had the privilege of working at the Cape Times when I was in my teens, so I’ve taken some personal exception to the damage Iqbal Surve has inflicted upon the newspaper, and the wider industry.
Not much that is not already known features in the book, but if Surve is to be held accountable, it will stand as force for the truth.
True Crime:Â An Unwitting Assassin by Susie Cazenove
Susie Cazenove is my cousin. An energetic writer, she has chronicled the extraordinary attempt her father, a troubled farmer called David Pratt, made on the life of Hendrik Verwoerd at the Rand Easter Show on the 9th April 1960. Another assassination attempt six years later by a parliamentary messenger was more successful, but Cazenove’s account of her life in South Africa and relationship with the man who would commit suicide in an institution a year after the attempt is both revealing and moving.
History:Â Chasing Churchill (The Travels of Winston Churchill) by Celia Sandys
Churchill’s granddaughter has documented his travels with light but considered reflection, visiting the places of significance in his life. I’m not Churchill’s greatest fan, but this was well written and engaging, the author clearly harbouring a soft spot for South Africa.
- Simon Lincoln Reader lives and works in London.
