Includes bibliographical references (pages 217-228) and index.

pt. 1. By fair means or very foul. 1. As it was in the beginning -- 2. The pursuit of new wars -- 3. An unlikely champion arises -- pt. 2. Brilliance and opportunism's brief then fading moment. 4. Human rights, personal tragedy, and drought -- 5. The end of war in Mozambique : Mugabe's Roman triumph -- 6. Amazing grace and decline -- 7. Interlude : houses of hunger : the intellectual debates of Zimbabwe -- pt. 3. The old man's ruthless stand. 8. Mugabe's path of discomforts, one : disease, war, the constitution -- 9. Mugabe's path of discomforts, two : land and persecution -- 10. Mugabe's path of discomforts, three : ghosts and spectres -- 11. Elections 2002.

"Robert Mugabe - modern Africa's Stalin or a patriot fighting to reverse the effects of colonialism and white domination? Stephen Chan seeks not to demonise Mugabe but to explain and interpret him in his role as a key player in Zimbabwe and Southern Africa. In this masterly portrait, Mugabe's character unfolds with the ebb and flow of triumph and crisis over more than 22 years of his rule. Mugabe's story is Zimbabwe's from the post-independence honeymoon of idealism and reconciliation, through electoral victory, successful intervention in the international politics of Southern Africa and resistance to South Africa's policy of apartheid. But a darker picture emerged early with the savage crushing of the Matabelelands rising, the elimination of political opponents, growing corruption, disastrous intervention in the Congo war, and all worsened by drought and the HIV/AIDS crisis. Here was a beleaguered president in the face of growing unrest resorting to increasingly desperate measures - seizing white-owned farms, increasing presidential constitutional powers, muzzling the press and intimidating opposition."--Jacket.