Few African politicians polarize as much as Robert Mugabe. Christoph Marx vividly and candidly recounts the life of this intelligent yet unscrupulous dictator who plunged Zimbabwe into misery. While Mugabe is seen in the West as the prototype of the African despot, he is still surprisingly viewed positively in Africa despite his decades-long reign of violence over Zimbabwe and the destruction of the country. However, Mugabe was long celebrated in Europe as a liberator. The notion that he is a fallen revolutionary persists stubbornly. Christoph Marx now paints a new picture of Mugabe, showing that the once-perceived beacon of hope was willing to use any means necessary from the very beginning to satisfy his overwhelming thirst for power.