Haile Sellassie I
Discover the legacy of Haile Sellassie I through essential books, from Graham Hancock's The Sign and the Seal to Ryszard Kapuscinski's The Emperor—explore history, biography, and Ethiopian royalty in this curated reading list.
Book
The Emperor
by Ryszard Kapuscinski
A "sensitive, powerful ... history" (The New York Review of Books) of a man living amidst nearly unimaginable pomp and luxury while his people teetered netween hunger and starvation. Haile Selassie, King of Kings, Elect of God, Lion of Judah, His Most Puissant Majesty and Distinguished Highness the Emperor of Ethiopia, reigned from 1930 until he was overthrown by the army in 1974. While the fighting still raged, Ryszard Kapuscinski, Poland's leading foreign correspondent, traveled to Ethiopia to seek out and interview Selassie's servants and closest associates on how the Emperor had ruled and why he fell. This is Kapuscinski's rendition of their accounts—humorous, frightening, sad, groteque.
