When A Crocodile Eats The Sun by Peter Godwin

 

 

The reasons for picking up this book are two. First, I have always been curious about the lives of the White Africans (an oxymoron I realized later). Second, the passing away of Heath Streak, my favourite Zimbabwean cricketer, in September 2023, rekindled the desire to pick up a work of fiction/non-fiction on the subject.

In “When A Crocodile Eats The Sun”, Peter Godwin weaves the deeply personal and the political together through his gripping narrative in this work of non-fiction set in his beloved Zimbabwe.

The Zimbabwe of his childhood is gradually falling apart, the Whites are no longer welcome, many have left as a result, yet him and several others like him can’t sever the umbilical cord. He keeps longing for Africa despite having settled in New York with partner and kids.

He oscillates between a journalist and a memoirist. As a journalist he is very objective when writing about the deteriorating political situation in Zimbabwe. For example, he gives a balanced view of why the situation has turned sour for the Whites post-Independence. The Whites controlled 50% of the land in colonial times when they made up just a miniscule 1% of the population. He sheds light on why race is a potent political weapon in Africa. However, as a son and a White, one can clearly make out his despondency and despair when writing about his family history and elderly parents in Harare. His remembrance of his dead elder sister Jain makes for pensive reading.

As he grapples on several fronts, he never expected a dark secret to stumble out of the family closet. That his father, who he had known to be English all his life, was actually a Polish Jew from Warsaw. George Godwin had kept it a secret from his children on purpose. Peter learns of his father’s Jewish birth name from his mother, Helen. He maintains as much of a measured tone as possible as he delves deeper into the paternal side of his family and what they had to endure due to Holocaust, something that haunted his father till his last. For example, George Godwin could never get over that his mother and younger sister perished in a concentration camp. That at the age of 10, he was separated from his father Mauricy (author’s paternal grandfather) and they never met again and kept in touch only through letters. The details are heart-wrenching.

Despite the measured tone, the reader can sense Peter’s deep admiration for what his father George went through, all of 10, stranded alone in England, cut off from his Polish family on account of World War II.

One gets a good account of the author’s true blue African blood when he shares intricate details of Zimbabwean and African customs. For example, why the Zulu tribe bury their dead under the Aloe tree. That the docile looking Hippopotamus kills more people than any other mammal. Another one, the Dande tribe inhabiting the Zambezi valley follow a strict hierarchy when fetching water from rivers etc. There are plenty more. Only someone born and raised in Africa would know and understand those peculiarities. No wonder Georgina, his London based younger sister, laments to him that their children will never know Africa the way the siblings did.

Although the title of the book “When a crocodile eats the sun “is taken from the Zulu tribal expression of the solar eclipse, it can be interpreted in the political context of Zimbabwe as well. The readers can very well make out who the crocodile and sun are. Surprisingly, it is not just the White Zimbabweans who have been at the receiving end, Black Zimbabweans have suffered as much due to the deteriorating situation. For instance, amendment to the farm ownership rules left thousands of black farm workers unemployed. Blacks who supported the Opposition were termed “mwengi” which means enemy and subjected to political violence.

With regards to his narrative style, the author takes an analytical-viewpoint approach to the political situation and a descriptive-non-linear one for the family history. And, borrowing from fiction perhaps, Peter Godwin manages to insert a twist in the tale as well towards the end with regards to his father’s last rites borne out of necessity and in deference to the latter’s last wish.

The Godwins may have left Zimbabwe for good with George having passed away, Helen with Georgina in London and Peter in New York, yet the umbilical cord remains unbroken for the eldest sister Jain lays buried in Harare, Zimbabwe.

This book is very much recommended to those who wish to understand the uniqueness, complexities and contradictions that is Africa from a White African’s perspective.