Congolese Stories

From the author of the New York Times bestselling and award-winning Not on Our Watch, John Prendergast co-writes a compelling book with Fidel Bafilemba--with stunning photographs by Ryan Gosling--revealing the way in which the people and resources of the Democratic Republic of Congo have been used throughout the last five centuries to build, develop, advance, and safeguard the United States and Europe. The book highlights the devastating price Congo has paid for that support. However, the way the world deals with Congo is finally changing, and the book tells the remarkable stories of those in Congo and the United States leading that transformation. The people of Congo are fighting back against a tidal wave of international exploitation and governmental oppression to make things better for their nation, their neighborhoods, and their families. They are risking their lives to resist and alter the deadly status quo. And now, finally, there are human rights movements led by young people in the United States and Europe building solidarity with Congolese change-makers in support of dignity, justice, and equality for the Congolese people. As a result, the way the world deal with Congo is finally changing. Fidel Bafilemba, Ryan Gosling, and John Prendergast traveled to Congo to document some of the stories not only of the Congolese upstanders who are building a better future for their country but also of young Congolese people overcoming enormous odds just to go to school and help take care of their families. Through Gosling's photographs of Congolese daily life, Bafilemba's profiles of heroic Congolese activists, and Prendergast's narratives of the extraordinary history and evolving social movements that directly link Congo with the United States and Europe, Congo Stories provides windows into the history, the people, the challenges, the possibilities, and the movements that could change the course of Congo's destiny. Chosen by Amazon as the Best Book of the Month for December 2018 in Biographies & Memoirs, History, and Nonfiction. Featuring the life story of Dr. Denis Mukwege, winner of the 2018 Nobel Peace Prize

Featuring the life story of Dr. Denis Mukwege, winner of the 2018 Nobel Peace Prize From the author of the New York Times bestselling and award-winning Not on Our Watch, John Prendergast co-writes a compelling book with Fidel Bafilemba--with stunning photographs by Ryan Gosling--revealing the way in which the people and resources of the Democratic Republic of Congo have been used throughout the last five centuries to build, develop, advance, and safeguard the United States and Europe. The book highlights the devastating price Congo has paid for that support. However, the way the world deals with Congo is finally changing, and the book tells the remarkable stories of those in Congo and the United States leading that transformation. The people of Congo are fighting back against a tidal wave of international exploitation and governmental oppression to make things better for their nation, their neighborhoods, and their families. They are risking their lives to resist and alter the deadly status quo. And now, finally, there are human rights movements led by young people in the United States and Europe building solidarity with Congolese change-makers in support of dignity, justice, and equality for the Congolese people. As a result, the way the world deal with Congo is finally changing. Fidel Bafilemba, Ryan Gosling, and John Prendergast traveled to Congo to document some of the stories not only of the Congolese upstanders who are building a better future for their country but also of young Congolese people overcoming enormous odds just to go to school and help take care of their families. Through Gosling's photographs of Congolese daily life, Bafilemba's profiles of heroic Congolese activists, and Prendergast's narratives of the extraordinary history and evolving social movements that directly link Congo with the United States and Europe, CONGO STORIES provides windows into the history, the people, the challenges, the possibilities, and the movements that could change the course of Congo's destiny.

Congo’s folk tales are rich and diverse. Legends, myths, tales and fables have been passed on from generation to generation, and in some cases a tale or a fable has been shortened into a proverb with a vast cultural significance that varies depending on the storyteller’s depiction of it. From a single source that can be summed up in just a few words, the African storyteller relates human imperfection and morality, religious representations and the surrounding nature to his listeners. Children gather in a circle around the storyteller and as he talks of lifeless objects, such as a piece of pottery, or African animals as symbolic of people, everyone listens enthusiastically. He needn’t explain what a calabash is (the dried shell of a bottle gourd from the cucurbit vine). His listeners recognise the names of large trees as well as common animals that appear in the fables. To directly translate an African storyteller’s representation is nearly impossible since it would require too much detailed interpretation. Instead, I have tried to use the same method as African storytellers use. Beginning with a basic topic, I have attempted to explain Congo’s environment to Swedish children and hopefully to older readers as well. The material used in these tales comes from two spokesmen of today’s Congo-Brazzaville. The first, Monsieur N’Zaba Philippe, comes from the Babembe tribe. He has been the dedicated district leader for the mission area of Dolisie for many years. The second is Monsieur Pomo from the woodland inhabitants of Bambamba, a tribe attached to the Bakuta people. Some of the tales have been obtained from Congolese literature. Gothenburg 1964, Bertil Söderberg For Jan-Olov, Kerstin, Per and Mats

A collection of short stories which piece together a view of a post-colonial African nation. The author concentrates on the many problems and contradictions which confront educated black minorities in their attempts to develop modern, egalitarian states.

"The Congo Basin in Central Africa harbors approximately one quarter of the world's rainforests. Second in size only to that of the Amazon, the heart of this rainforest is populated by communities whose lives are vastly different from much of the rest of the world. This stunning photo series is part of the Tales of Us project, which sets out to demonstrate that the powerful but fragile ecosystems and the mythologies of the peoples who call them home are inextricably linked. In this book, local Congolese living in the Mbomo District staged and enacted the oral history of the Congo for fine art photographer Pieter Henket under the canopy of the ancient rainforest from which these stories sprang." --Page 4 of cover.

A "tremendous," "intrepid" history of the devastating war in the heart of Africa's Congo, with first-hand accounts of the continent's worst conflict in modern times. At the heart of Africa is the Congo, a country the size of Western Europe, bordering nine other nations, that since 1996 has been wracked by a brutal war in which millions have died. In Dancing in the Glory of Monsters, renowned political activist and researcher Jason K. Stearns has written a compelling and deeply-reported narrative of how Congo became a failed state that collapsed into a war of retaliatory massacres. Stearns brilliantly describes the key perpetrators, many of whom he met personally, and highlights the nature of the political system that brought these people to power, as well as the moral decisions with which the war confronted them. Now updated with a new introduction, Dancing in the Glory of Monsters tells the full story of Africa's Great War.

The epic story of the Congo-Océan railroad and the human costs and contradictions of modern empire. The Congo-Océan railroad stretches across the Republic of Congo from Brazzaville to the Atlantic port of Pointe-Noir. It was completed in 1934, when Equatorial Africa was a French colony, and it stands as one of the deadliest construction projects in history. Colonial workers were subjects of an ostensibly democratic nation whose motto read “Liberty, Equality, Fraternity,” but liberal ideals were savaged by a cruelly indifferent administrative state. African workers were forcibly conscripted and separated from their families, and subjected to hellish conditions as they hacked their way through dense tropical foliage—a “forest of no joy”; excavated by hand thousands of tons of earth in order to lay down track; blasted their way through rock to construct tunnels; or risked their lives building bridges over otherwise impassable rivers. In the process, they suffered disease, malnutrition, and rampant physical abuse, likely resulting in at least 20,000 deaths. In the Forest of No Joy captures in vivid detail the experiences of the men, women, and children who toiled on the railroad, and forces a reassessment of the moral relationship between modern industrialized empires and what could be called global humanitarian impulses—the desire to improve the lives of people outside of Europe. Drawing on exhaustive research in French and Congolese archives, a chilling documentary record, and heartbreaking photographic evidence, J.P. Daughton tells the epic story of the Congo-Océan railroad, and in doing so reveals the human costs and contradictions of modern empire.