Joan of Arc with connections

This is a book long anticipated, as much in dread of dire news from Zimbabwe as in expectation of brilliant reporting spiced by mordant wit. It does not disappoint. Judith Todd’s chronicle of Mugabe’s crimes against his people appals, yet the ‘life’ of the subtitle has been a high-spirited crusade for justice, democracy and freedom of the press. Firmly attached to the progressive values of Grace and Garfield Todd, benevolent paternalists engaged in ranching, healing, teaching and politicking in south-west Zimbabwe since 1934, their daughter has proven to be cut from the same cloth. But now they are all gone.

Through the Darkness displays the sly humour long ago apparent in The Right to Say No. (She suggests that Mugabe’s ruling party should have restyled itself ZANU (RF) instead of ZANU (PF) after it nominated several diehard Rhodesian Fronters to parliamentary seats in the gift of the President.) Knaves and hypocrites of all stripes should beware Miss Todd — she takes few prisoners. Thirty-five years later she catches up with the Anglican prison chaplain who lied to her about her father’s attitude to her hunger strike when both had been arrested by the Smith regime. She can write with asperity, occasionally with bitterness, but these pages are overwhelmingly warm and compassionate, particularly towards the black victims of oppression whom she succoured. If Miss Todd were merely a Zimbabwean Joan of Arc now stripped of her citizenship, this book would be less interesting than it is. Even though she mainly confines her narrative to her own experiences, letters and diaries, making no pretence to be writing an academically sourced monograph, she has witnessed and done enough over 40 years to make this an invaluable source book for historians.

Judith Todd has known — taken care to know — a remarkable number of actors in the drama, politicians, journalists, diplomats, priests.