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Cecil Rhodes Flawed Colossus Author: Brian Roberts 319pp; 240 X 160mm; 8pp black and white pics, one map. Hardback; ISBN 0-393-02575-6

In 1870 a sickly, diffident youth named Cecil Rhodes set out from England to join his brother in the newly discovered diamond fields of South Africa. Within the space of a few short years he would forge an empire in diamond and gold mining enterprises that would make him one of the richest men in the world. By the late 1880s his personal income was estimated to be in the neighbourhood of one million pounds sterling per year. He would become Prime Minister of the Cape Colony; he would organise and finance the occupation of vast tracts of southern Africa over which he would exercise almost undisputed power — all by the age of 37. Rhodes died at the early age of 48, and his legacy was as much a puzzle to his contemporaries as it is today. On the positive side there was the establishment of the Rhodes’ Scholarships at Oxford, which endure as the principal monuments to his memory.

His career in politics and business was never free from the taint of self interest and financial chicanery. ‘Tell me a man’s ambitions,’ Rhodes once said, ‘and I will tell you his price.’

The Jameson Raid, a ploy by Rhodes to overthrow the Boer government of the Transvaal, was a disgrace from which his reputation never recovered. Towards the end of his life he was involved in an unsavoury scandal with an adventuress named Princess Radziwill who had stolen certain damaging documents from his desk.

A newspaper obituary said of Rhodes that he ‘lived only for his schemes and enjoyed life only as a cannon ball enjoys space, travelling to its aim blindly and spreading ruin

on its way.’ There is no doubt that whoever wrote it would not have dared to say it while Rhodes was still alive.

This book is a major assessment of the man who was the architect of the British Empire and who was its quintessential personality.

For more on Cecil Rhodes log onto www.cecilrhodes.co.za
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Media reviews:

Splendidly readable and fair minded . . . a story told with pace and drama.
The Observer - London

Brian Roberts is exceptionally well-equipped to attempt this task, and there is no doubt that this is the best biography yet written on Rhodes.
The Spectator - London

Readers’ comments:

There has long been a need for a new assessment of Cecil Rhodes, and now Brian Roberts has given us this brilliant and sparkling biography of one of the most extraordinary men of modern times.
Byron Farwell

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