To say that Ramonet is an uncritical interviewer would be an understatement. Occasionally, he poses a more difficult question to Castro, who has ruled a single-party state for nearly 50 years, mentioning that some dare to call the Cuban leader a 'dictator' and raising the question of the political repression that has been a persistent feature of his rule. Yet as the introduction makes abundantly clear, the author is a fan.


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Fidel is one of them,' Ramonet tells us on the third page. We also learn, fairly predictably, that 'ideas bubble in a brilliant stream' from this 'quick strategic thinker' who is 'moved by humanitarian compassion and internationalist solidarity' and 'likes precision, accuracy, exactitude, punctuality'.

We learn that 'under [Castro's] leadership, his little country has even stared down the United States, whose leaders have not been able to overthrow him or kill him, or even jostle the revolution off its path'. We learn, too, that Castro is a man who in private is affable, courteous, considerate and frugal, all of which has been said by innumerable hagiographers of innumerable such figures over the centuries, including Stalin, Hitler and Napoleon.

And we also learn when Castro learnt to swim. Thankfully, Castro is a good raconteur and not averse to speaking at length about episodes such as the battles in the mountains that led him to power. This breaks up the long, slow plod through fairly turgid Marxist interpretations of world history, sophomoric anti-Americanism and some fairly haphazard analysis of contemporary foreign affairs 'In England, the jails are full of Irish prisoners who had political, patriotic motives'. Castro's account of dragging an asthmatic Guevara through the Cuban hills in a downpour with hundreds of government troops in wet, cold pursuit is genuinely gripping and, in later parts of the books, his thumbnail sketches of other world leaders, though sometimes lurching towards caricatures, are entertaining.

Tony Blair is 'haughty, arrogant' and annoys Castro by looking at him like 'a nobody, a nit, a Third World know-nothing' when the Cuban leader ticks him off for lecturing everyone about child labour.

Castro's thoughts are also stimulating when he talks about guerrilla warfare. Many years ago, I interviewed Ahmed Shah Massoud, the Afghan guerrilla commander, who, listless and tired, had only shown any energy when he started talking about the tactics he had used against the Soviets and which fighters had inspired him. Castro clearly has the same deep fascination for the technicalities of such conflict, invoking the examples of Alexander the Great, Hannibal, the Vietnamese, the Algerians and European resistance fighters in the Second World War.

Review: My Life by Fidel Castro | Books | The Guardian

It was, he tells Ramonet, Hemingway's great Spanish Civil War novel, For Whom the Bell Tolls, that allowed he and his fighters 'to actually see' the experience of 'an irregular struggle, from the political and military point of view'. And we always went back to it, consulted it, to find inspiration,' Castro says. And it is this image - of the ragged, bearded revolutionary, carbine to hand, reading Hemingway in a Spanish translation in the Cuban hills - that has always clung to Castro and has aided him hugely.

For Ramonet, like millions of others, Castro is not a controversial dictator with a mixed record who has traced an interesting historical course, but the figurehead of opposition to the global hegemony of the United States and the other great, related bogeyman of the European left, 'neoliberal globalisation'.

And wreathed in legend, he can do no wrong. There is, of course, no discussion of whether 'neoliberal globalisation', that is a nefarious attempt to impose unbridled capitalism on the world's suffering, impoverished masses, actually exists; it is taken as a given.

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Towards the end of the lengthy introduction, Ramonet comments on the role of the journalist. A few paragraphs later, the reader learns that 'this In power in Cuba since when, with Che Guevara, he led a successful overthrow of Batista's regime. His very first attempt, an attack on the Moncada barracks in , had been unsuccessful. Fidel 'Fidelito' with his first wife, Mirta Diaz-Balart, from whom he was divorced in Ria Christie Collections Condition: Powell's Bookstores Chicago Condition: Used - Very Good.

Unless Listed in this decription, VG or Better. Your Online Bookstore Condition: World of Books Ltd Condition: Ships from the UK. Shows some signs of wear, and may have some markings on the inside. Your purchase also supports literacy charities. Better World Books Ltd Condition: Spine creases, wear to binding and pages from reading. May contain limited notes, underlining or highlighting that does affect the text.

Fidel Castro

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