When a Crocodile Eats the Sun: A Memoir of Africa

Written by Peter Godwin

Narrated by Peter Godwin

Peter Godwin, an award-winning writer, is on assignment in Zululand when he is summoned by his mother to
Zimbabwe, his birthplace. His father is seriously ill; she fears he is dying. Godwin finds his country, once a postcolonial success story, descending into a vortex of violence and racial hatred. His father recovers, but over the next
few years Godwin travels regularly between his family life in Manhattan and the increasing chaos of Zimbabwe, with
its rampant inflation and land seizures making famine a very real prospect. It is against this backdrop that Godwin
discovers a fifty-year-old family secret, one which changes everything he thought he knew about his father, and his
own place in the world.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Recorded Books, Inc.
• Release date: May 12, 2020
• ISBN: 9781980098225

Peter Godwin

Peter Godwin is an award winning author and journalist. Born and raised in Zimbabwe, he studied law and international relations at Cambridge and Oxford. He worked as a foreign correspondent in Africa and Eastern Europe for The Sunday Times of London. He was founding presenter and writer of Assignment/Correspondent, BBC TV's premier foreign affairs program. He now lives in Manhattan and contributes regularly to National Geographic, New York Times Magazine, and BBC Radio, among others.

Reviews for When a Crocodile Eats the Sun

[jennybeast · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Godwin manages to write a stirring personal story against the backdrop of Zimababwe's fall into chaos without losing the balance between the two. Fascinating, tragic, surprising. I know Zimbabwean expats who have spoken bitterly about the loss of their farms, but I never knew how different the situation there was from South Africa. This could have been such a different book -- full of anger and bitterness. Instead it is a celebration of a homeland; one that may never exist again.

[stanslong · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A moving tale of modern day oppression. So well written without overstatement and with some humour about sad happenings.

[danielstj · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Interesting book set in a thrilling setting.

[jbennett_733672 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Excellent if rather depressing book linking the author's father's decline in old age with that of Zimbabwe

[bookconcierge · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

3.5***

Peter Godwin was born and raised in Rhodesia. He was away at Oxford when the war for independence was finalized and the country became Zimbabwe. He returned in 1982, working for a time as a lawyer, but settling on journalism and moving away from his homeland. His parents remained in Zimbabwe, their failing health and increased frailty mirroring the slow destruction of a once-vibrant economy into anarchy and destruction. This is Godwin’s memoir of the years from 1996, when his father had his first heart attack, through 2004.

This was not what I was expecting. Somehow when I learned this was a memoir of a white African, I assumed it would be about his youth. But this is the story of an adult son coming to grips with the mortality of his parents, and learning something about himself as a man in the process. Along the way, Godwin examines the problems of the country he still calls “home,” though he may never live there again, nor even visit again. His brutal honesty about deteriorating conditions is an eye-opener to anyone who has ignored the relatively sparse newscasts about Zimbabwe’s “president” Robert Mugabe.

There really is no way for Godwin to tell his family story without also telling the story of Zimbabwe. I think he does a respectable job of journalistic reporting on the country and its issues, while still giving us a very personal and intimate look at his relationship with his parents and his home.

[klburnside · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Peter Godwin, the author of When A Crocodile Eats the Sun, is a white Zimbabwean who was raised in Zimbabwe by parents who had moved there from Europe. The book tells about Godwin’s travels from his current home in Manhattan to visit his parents in Zimbabwe the late 1990s and early 2000s. As a journalist, he has the opportunity to cover regional stories, so is able to travel frequently to the area. The book deals with both the personal and the political.

At this time in Zimbabwe, massive land redistribution is underway, with the regime forcibly taking land from white farmers and redistributing it to black Zimbabweans. Godwin spends a lot of time interviewing these farmers and learning of the situation. I found his portrayal of the situation to be very one-sided, sympathizing with the white farmers, while not acknowledging that there were some lasting problems created by colonialism that needed to be addressed. I don’t know a lot about this land redistribution, but I imagine the situation has to be much more complicated than Godwin portrays it to be. Yes, these farms were a major part of Zimbabwe’s economy and provided employment for many people, and it doesn’t seem right to remove farmers from their land when their farms are in full production and economically viable. It also doesn’t seem right that 70% of farmland is owned by the 5% white minority. Yes, Mugabe’s rule is horrible and oppressive, and the way land distribution was done didn’t work and wasn't fair, but Godwin’s perspective seemed to have a tone of longing for the good old days of white rule and the privileges he enjoyed in his childhood, while ignoring the suffering that occurred in that era. I felt especially unsympathetic towards the situation when it was revealed that the land was being used to grow tobacco or to raise racehorses.

That being said, I still found the book to be engaging and informative. It was interesting to learn about what life was like for white Zimbabweans, how the spread of HIV devastated the country and its economy, and how Mugabe’s rule has affected Zimbabwe’s people. I just would have more well-rounded depiction of these events, and at times I got really angry at the one sided accounts. Because Godwin is a journalist, I think I was expecting a more balanced approach, but maybe the book was intended to be more of a memoir than a piece of journalism.

[sullywriter_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

An exceptional memoir--fascinating, insightful, moving, and completely engrossing.

[popup8ch · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

An autobiographical story of the authors father, and how his life in many ways mirrored that of his chosen country, Zimbabwe. Godwin discovers that his father was a Polish jew, fleeing before the Nazis, and finally settling in Zimbabwe. The book focuses on the time 1996-2004, when the country is experiencing hyperinflation, farm seizures, economic decline and corruption.Zimbabwe in the early 1990's was widely regarded as an example of 'decolonization done right', but since then Mugabe and his kleptocratic cronies have managed to convert the bread-basket of sub-Saharan Africa into an AIDS-ravished dustbin of corruption and famine. Godwin illustrates this through personal anecdotes and touching examples, without becoming overly emotional.

[fourbears_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I read Godwin’s earlier memoir 10 years ago so naturally wanted to read this one, though I wondered what a man younger than I by a decade or more could have to write two memoirs about. The answer is “plenty”. This one is focuses on the period between 1996 and 2004 when Robert Mugabe is encouraging the “wovits” (supposedly vets of the civil war but mostly thugs and opportunists) to confiscate land from white settlers. Mugabe seems to want to get rid of whites in Zimbabwe and to make what was a country genuinely successful at developing a multi-racial society into an all black country; ruining the country's economy in the process. Production is down, the economy is shrinking, inflation is off the wall. Not only whites but middle class blacks are immigrating in droves.Godwin, a journalist, has lived in the UK and the US for years but loves his country and has made a specialty of getting jobs reporting from there. His parents remained there as did his sister, a TV journalist. What's compelling about this memoir, though, is the author's skill at simultaneously reporting on the beauty and promise and on the horrible political present of a part of the world most of us know little about and think of only as a place of abject poverty and ugliness. Godwin's love of Zimbabwe and its people, black and white, is infectious. But he's very talented also at weaving Zimbabwe's story in with that his own family. His older sister, killed by terrorists whose grave is vandalized. His physician mother who’s given and given again to the people of Zimbabwe. His younger sister whose journalism gets her banned to North London where she broadcasts back to Zimbabwe. Godwin learns during the time frame of the book that his tight-lipped British father is actually a Polish Jew and holocaust survivor trapped in Britain in 1939 where he went on a course to learn English. His mother and sister ended their lives in Treblinka. His father was never allowed to learn Poland. Godwin’s telling of his father's story would seem totally irrelevant to present day Africa, as would Goodwin’s own experience of volunteering his time in the wake of 9/11 (his own neighborhood), but that's the beauty of a good memoirist who can make anything that happens to him "relevant”. In the end he feel compelled to compare his own need to leave Africa with his father’s to leave Poland: “Like Poland was to him, Africa is for me: a place in which I can never truly belong, a dangerous place that will, if I allow it to, reach into my life and hurt my family. A white in Africa is like a Jew anywhere—on sufferance, watching wearily, waiting for the next great tidal swell of hostility.”I can’t recommend this book enough.

[lidbud · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This is a complex story of the Godwin family and the author's relationship with his aging parents and in particular his father. The standard and safety of the lives of his parents are gradually being eroded by the rule of the Mugabe Government on whites in Zimbabwe. The parents hiding of the fathers polish nationality and bringing up the children in the belief that they were stiff upper lip british made this true story all the more interesting. The father had escaped the holocaust by being in England during the war and was Jewish but after the war had married and emigrated to Zimbabwe completely hiding the identity of his past to his children.This was only discovered during the research of the book and around the time of the fathers death.Compelling and interesting reading. Signed Mr Lidbud

[sarazet · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Compelling account of a father gradually dying while he holds on to his life as a white in Zimbabwe. Conditions in the country deteriorate, and whites are less and less welcome, but still he holds on to memories of a full life there.

[debnance_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Zimbabwe during the past thirty years seems to have been a miserable place to live. Inflation caused prices of even the most basic items and services to soar. The government instituted a program where white-owned farms were taken over by black farmers, leaving the white farmers without a home and without a job. Looting was commonplace. Riots were commonplace. Medical services were overwhelmed, especially with AIDS patients. Election fraud was rampant. Despite all these problems, Godwin’s parents continued to hope that things would change for the better. They did not. Godwin’s memoir of the years he spent outside Zimbabwe, yet with close Zimbabwe connections, tells the story of a bleak world. It left me thinking about decisions people make to stay or to go when the world around one seems to be steadily spirally down. How does one decide? And if one does decide to stay, are there things that can be done to improve the situation?

[dauphine_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The title is correct - the book is a "memoir of Africa." I felt more of a connection about what was happening in Zimbabwe than I did with Peter Godwin and his family. There is certainly much in the book about his family and in particular his relationship with his father, but he seemed more detached in his writing about them than he did when writing about what was happening to Africa. It is a well written and moving book, heartbreaking actually.

[tangledthread · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A memoir of a white Zimbabwean expatriate attempting to care for his aging parents who are still living in Zimbabwe under the Mugabe regime. Peter Godwin does an excellent job of combining a personal story with a political story giving us chilling insights into the fragility of freedom, democracy, and human rights. Peter Godwin shows us how the wide arc of history cycles around and affects the present. His background in law and journalism helps him to tell us the story of the country he loves and mourns in a pragmatic way. The account of his parents' story shows us the personal impact of the larger story of a country under the heel of a greedy dictatorship.The story is sad and depressing, but one which is very important for all of us.In a note of sad irony, Morgan Tsvangirai and his wife, Susan, were in a traffic accident which took Susan's life the same day that we discussed this book in book group.

[mithril_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Moving, excellent writing.

[rafe_2 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Chilling. Chilling not because of what Mugabe wrought but because of how so many collaborated with him with easy brutality; because rationality has been suspended; because some in my country, like my president, so clearly identify with the madness. The memoir tells the story of the author's parents' life in Rhodesia/Zimbabwe and more specifically the last years of their stoic, caring lives against the backdrop of the collapsing country that they loved. Godwin describes the collapse dispassionately but every now and then the anger, frustration and incomprehension ripples the calm waters of his prose. And it is brilliant prose.Yet there is also the warmth of hope. The warmth of ordinary people of all races showing compassion and goodwill to each other. Nothing is predictable in Africa.

[colmena_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Excellent portrayal of Zimbabwe and the struggles that have been placed upon the people due to Robert Mugabe’s reign of terror upon this beautiful country and it’s beautiful people. I had the opportunity to go to Victoria Falls and was touched by the wonderful people and the terror that they faced everyday. He is a gifted writer and I look forward to reading his other works.

[idgoddard · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Very well written. Poignant, heartbreaking, true story of the collapse of Zimbabwe and the disastrous results for the people who loved the country.

[emhromp2 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A brilliant book about Zimbabwe. I learnt so much about this country by reading this novel. Godwin stays fairly neutral throughout, it is not a political novel, it is literature at its best! Again, I loved this book. It was very difficult to get through, and you really need to be in the mood for a depressing story like this.

[getupkid10 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A part political history/current event book about the last ten years in Zimbabwe, a country that is falling apart under the rule of the ZANU-PF tyrant Robert Mugabe, part family memoir about Godwin's family, whose parents were British and Pole Jewish immigrants. Although the book is strong, I wonder about the one sided nature of the story, since the white farmers do not have a hint of racist anger in them. It would seem to me that people that have been evicted from farms, had friends murdered and have been forced to move across the border to Mozambique would have some people among them that would resort to some racist feeling ( I personally think it is only natural that a percentage of them would have some racist feelings). Yet, you never read about these people.Also, the political portion could be better served if it discussed the history of the MDC, it's leader Morgan Tsvangirai and what it's members have faced (especially with the current election). However, since it is a memoir, it is a minor detail and maybe not necessary.

[lkdigi_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I found this story to be a compelling narrative of not only the downward spiral of Zimbabwe, but of the love of place and each other that holds a family together. The writing is good, very good and one comes away from the book with a greater understanding of post-colonial Africa and the troubles it faces. The cherry on top is a greater appreciation for the families we love.

[jonquirk · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A very powerful book that unfolds in a simple, highly personal way, the terrors of modern-day Zimbabwe and the horrors of the Mugabe regime. A tale of a couple socially-aware caring parents intent to the end on supporting and caring for the society in which they developed and raised a family at a time when they were rootless and seeking such home, yet a society the heart and soul of which Robert Gabriel Mugabe is intent on ripping the heart out of. A search for identity and meaning in chaos with a surprising twist and a tale that will leave you gutted, enraged, and furious at (some) men's inhumanity to humanity. Brilliant.

[kymarlee_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Great book. Fascinating family history against the backdrop of Africa. Very interesting history of the country of Zimbabwe and struggles for a democratic way of life under the totalitarian ruler Mugabe. Personal family memoir of parents who will not let go of the dream and children who can not let go of the their African childhood.

[jonmodene · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Great read. A sad and tragic and very touching look at the destruction of Zimbabwe by the tyrant Mugabe. 25% of the people have left. 25% perhaps are dead. One of the wealthiest nations in Africa reduced to penury wiht help from North Korea, China, and assorted neighbors and NGO's interested in a fast buck.Read it and weep.