Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1003204 in Books
• Published on: 1998-08-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 650 pages

Synopsis
**** Cited in Books for College Libraries, 3rd ed.. This history was originally published by Simon and Schuster in 1965, but this reprint is of the edition published in London in 1989. It details the 60-year existence of the Zulu Nation, from its brutal formation and zenith, through its inevitable collisions with white expansionism, to its dissolut

Customer Reviews

The first 'widescreen' book I've ever read.
This is a truly amazing book, and the fact that some of Morris' assessments and conclusions have lost favour in the light of modern research should not deter an interested student.

I've read a lot of history books, but very few bring the past alive, or involve the reader in the way a novel might. The completeness and inevitability of the Zulu victory at Isandlhwana, for example, is probably well known to all prospective readers but even so, the account of this battle makes for a thrilling, moving read.

The epic history of the Zulu people is well documented and makes one eager to pursue further reading (Ian Knight's excellent books come well reccommended), giving a fairly rounded view of the conflict.

All in all this is a well balanced work which does not flinch from revealing the tragedy of the fait acompli wrought for the British Government by a few ambitious men in the field.

Definitive History of the Zulu War and much more....
When Donald Morris started to research a book on the Anglo-Zulu War of 1879, he realized that the story would not be complete without an account of the rise of the Zulu clan out of the Mtetwa Empire to be one of the greatest native empires Africa has ever seen. Nor would it suffice to excise the tales of the tentative but soon irresistible tide of European expansion into Natal and their fascinating introduction to and intermingling with their Zulu neighbors.

Morris deftly wields all of this and more into this well researched and highly readable book. Personalities from the brilliant, psychopathic and yet strangely pathetic Shaka to the doomed romantic naivete of Louis Napoleon come colorfully alive in the narrative. Ditto with the richly illustrated locations, from a claustrophobic hut in an isolated kraal to the grassy endless expanses of Zululand. He'll further take you from the sheer horror of the desperate fighting at Islandwana, to the tragicomic pageant at Ulundi where one Empire exterminates another, with both dressed up in their glorious finery.

This is great history writing at its best. Your taken to a previous time and place and are given a front seat to a collision of worlds. A truly magnificent work.

A definitive review of the Zulu nation
I enjoyed this book very much. It is extremely detailed and at the same time very lively to read. The detailed account of the Isandhlwana and Rorke's Drift battles were minute by minute accounting of soldiers, zulus, and the battle itself. The author does not judge either side, and after reading you are equally impressed with both the Zulu and English. No other book I have read goes into this much detail and this enjoybale to read.