a very powerful, scathing critique on bourgeoisie academics, writers, and thinkers who often maligned non-european / non-western traditions as primitive and in need of 'rearing', as if whole swathes of people outside of the western sphere were mere babes in need of parental guidance, aimé césaire delivers a poetic and justified repudiation against all the massacres and crimes against humanity that any 'civilising' force has ever committed under the banner of so-called 'benevolent' rule.

this serves as a wonderful and compelling introduction to postcolonialism. this does not mean to say that it goes light in terms of theory — the whole piece is practically a theoretical lambasting of reigning bourgeoisie imperialist interests — but an underlining of the fact that césaire's prose jumps at the page and sears itself into your consciousness, emphasising the undeniable fact that what has been committed is injustice, that the weight of innumerable sins does stamp itself forevermore into european civilisation, and that what must be done is necessary.