Books and reading

Jeune Afrique: You came to France recently to participate in the Silva conference on the trees and forests where the problem of the advancing desert was raised, a problem of grea5 concern to your country. Have you read any books on this topic?
Thomas Sankara: [Smiling] No, they're too dry.
Jeune Afrique: What was the last book you read?
Thomas Sankara: La gauche le plus bête du monde [The most stupid left in the world] by Jean Dutourd. There are some amusing things in it. It’s relaxing.
Jeune Afrique: That’s a book on the upcoming elections in France, written by a right wing journalist. Does the election campaign in France interest you that much?
Thomas Sankara: No. It amuses me.
Jeune Afrique: But you read political books?
Thomas Sankara: Of course. Without giving myself away, I can nonetheless admit to being familiar with the classics of Marxism-Leninism.
Jeune Afrique: You've surely read Capital by Karl Marx.
Thomas Sankara: No, not all of it. But I have read all of Lenin.
Jeune Afrique: Would you take these works with you if you were to find yourself on a desert island.
Thomas Sankara: Certainly State and Revolution [by Lenin]. This is a book I take refuge in, that I reread often. Depending on whether I’m in a good or a bad mood, I interpret the words and sentences in different ways. But on an island, I would also take the Bible and the Koran.
Jeune Afrique: You find that Lenin, Jesus and Muhammad go well together?
Thomas Sankara: Yes. There are many references to the Bible and the Koran in my speeches. I believe these three works form the three most powerful currents of thought in our world, except perhaps for Asia.
State and Revolution provides an answer to problems that require a revolutionary solution. On the other hand, the Bible and Koran allow us to synthesize what people’s thought in the past and what they continue to think, in time and space.
Jeune Afrique: Who, according to you, is the most revolutionary of the three?
Thomas Sankara: That depends on the period. In modern times, it goes without saying that Lenin is the most revolutionary. But it’s undeniable that Muhammad was a revolutionary who turned a society upside down. Jesus was too, but his revolution remained unfinished. He ends up being abstract, while Muhammad was able to be more materialist. We received the word of Christ as a message capable of saving us from the real misery we lived in, as a philosophy of qualitative transformation of the world. But we were disappointed by the use to which it was put. When we had to look for something else, we found the class struggle.
Jeune Afrique: Among political writers today, are there some whose writings you appreciate more than others?
Thomas Sankara: In general, I find them all interesting. Whether it’s military books, books on tactics, or on the organization of labor. De Gaulle, for example, I’ve read most of his books. Mitterrand too, L’abeille et l'architecte [The bee and the architect]. He writes well but not just for the pleasure of writing. You understand though his writings that he wanted to become president, and he succeeded.
Jeune Afrique: You have a library, I suppose?
Thomas Sankara: No, absolutely not. My books are in trunks. A library is dangerous, it betrays. As a matter of fact, I don’t like saying what I read, either. I never make notes in a book or underline passages. Because that’s where you reveal the most about yourself. It can be a true personal diary.
Jeune Afrique: Apart from official speeches, do you yourself write?
Thomas Sankara: Yes, I have for a long time. Since 1966. I was still in high school. Every night. There was a short interruption starting in 1982. But I’ve taken it up again since then. I write down thoughts.
Jeune Afrique: Do you intend to publish them?
Thomas Sankara: No, I don’t think so.
Jeune Afrique: What book would you have like to have written?
Thomas Sankara: A book on organizing and building for the happiness of the people’s.
Jeune Afrique: Don’t you like books as relaxation?
Thomas Sankara: No, I don’t read to pass the time nor to discover a fine narrative.
Jeune Afrique: How do you choose your books?
Thomas Sankara: Well, first I should say that I buy them. And it’s the tile more than the author that catches my eye. I don’t read to discover the literary journey of a writer. I like to look ahead to new men, new situations.
Jeune Afrique: Let’s talk a bit about African literature, about Burkinabè writers. Which of them has made an impression on you?
Thomas Sankara: I don’t like African novels. Any more than films, as a matter of fact. Those I’ve read have disappointed me. It’s always the same story: the young African goes to Paris, suffers, and when he returns he’s out of touch with tradition.
Jeune Afrique: You’re rendering to L'aventure ambiquë [Ambiguous adventure] by Cheik Hamidou Kane!
Thomas Sankara: Yes, and I don’t like this way of describing people. In African literature it’s not really blacks who are speaking. You have the impression you’re dealing with blacks who want to speak French at all costs. That bothers me. The authors should write like we speak today.
Jeune Afrique: You’d rather they speak pidgin French?
Thomas Sankara: To a certain extent, I’d prefer that. Anyhow, the African writers I prefer are those who deal with concrete problems, even if o don’t agree with their positions. I don’t like those who seek to write for literary effect.
Jeune Afrique: In your office in Ouagadougou you have the complete works of Lenin in a really fine edition.
Thomas Sankara: Yes, but I’ve read Lenin in a more practical edition, a little like those paperback series that I found when I went to get my supply of books in Paris at 1 Paul Painlevé Place, at the Herbes-Sauvages bookstore.
Jeune Afrique: Are you familiar with Arabic literature?
Thomas Sankara: Yes, I’ve read a few Algerian and Tunisian books. A book about Oum Kalsoum, the Egyptian singer. The author? I don’t remember names. I’ve also read a book called L'Autogestion en Algérie [Self-management in Algeria] written by a member of the National Liberation Front.
Jeune Afrique: So you don’t read novels?
Thomas Sankara: No, almost never. I recently read a novel by chance, L’Amour en vogue [Love in fashion], a simple story. It was a book on sale. I went into a bookstore and bought it.
Jeune Afrique: No detective stories either? What about the SAS book by Gérard de Villiers, for example, that takes place in Ouagadougou?
Thomas Sankara: No, I’m not interested in it. It’s a similar literary genre. Apparently Gerard de Villiers came to Ouagadougou before writing the book in the SAS series. He never asked to see me.
Jeune Afrique: Why not? In the spy genre, I’m reading the Devil’s Alternative by Frederick Forsyth at the moment. It sheds a lot of light on the duplicity of the great powers.
Jeune Afrique; There’s a Burkinabè author who you obviously know well and who lives in exile: Ki-Zerbo. Have you read his books?
Thomas Sankara: Yes, his studies are very interesting. But he’s still an African with a complex, he came to France, he learned, then he returned home to write so that his African brothers might recognize and see in him what wasn’t seen or recognized in France. Nothing is more frustrating for an African than to reach the top without having been crowned in France. He says to himself that at home, at least, he will he recognized as one of the greats.
Jeune Afrique: What has become of him?
Thomas Sankara: When the revolution called, he fled. I’ve asked him to come back twice, but he wants to hide his continual failures. He never succeeded in Burkina, neither by the electoral route nor the putschist route. That’s why he left. I met with him twice before he left. We were happy he left because we sensed he was really very scared, and we didn’t want him to die from that, to die on us, which would have brought us terrible accusations. Once he left, he went over to the active opposition. But he can come back whenever he wants. The door is open for him.