Do you believe this book?

[lavkathleen]

For that single incident regarding Castro, I won't say that it is impossible to be happened in that manner. But usually when such minor and secret things are done with the help of minor workers, usually they are the ones who reveal them first, not the ones who either took the responsibility or gave the order. Here it has happened the other way round. How can such a thing remain as a secret, even without getting out as a rumour, until Dr. Berrah mentioned it in his book?

In my experience in learning more about local and global history, there are always bits and pieces of the details that's only passed forward by the word of mouth. They're not widely spread either, and then there's the problem of altering history and only having a convenient, useful part of it available for the bigger public. There are people out there who knows it, but how many among them had the resources that Dr. Berrah had to pass it on?

[Mtibza eM]

Yes, I believe the book. I don't think the author would have lied about such things. There are a lot of people who could have discredited it, otherwise.

[Sushan Ekanayake]

Yes, I believe the book. I don't think the author would have lied about such things. There are a lot of people who could have discredited it, otherwise.

In general terms, the facts in the book are definitely true. No one can just draw an imaginary picture about things that are concerned at international level.

But I am speaking about the facts which are mostly personal to Dr. Berrah. There are things that maybe only he could have known, or only known by a very limited number of people. As per my opinion, such occasions are used in this book to make Dr. Berrah the ultimate hero. Those are the points that I mention as hard to believe

[Aan Granados]

I completely agree with everyone's opinions here. I think that maybe some incidents may be exaggerated. You are right that he should include his failures too.

[Laura Britos]

I think that even though we try to write a book that only brings true events and/or phrases, it's inevitable to be biased. Therefore, I think it is likely that the author didn't describe everything exactly like the events that occurred and I agree with you when you said that Dr. Berrah might have altered some things when writing this book.

Yea, we become the hero of our own story when we tell it. So, we are tend to either add some exaggeration or make the story more dramatic. Apparently that is what has happened here. But I think that the summary of the story is more or less correct

Exactly my thoughts. We tend to tell our own stories with some embellishments which is what the author has done. Who wouldn't. He was successful so it wouldn't be difficult adding some salt like we say it in my place.

I liked your take on this matter. It is easy to exaggerate a bit or gloss over certain topics in a book in order to have a bigger impact on readers. After all, books shape our thoughts and personalities, so authors can use writing and glamorise it in order to have a powerful tool.

[63tty]

I think a little was exergerated. Many people write biographies to appease the person.

[Sushan Ekanayake]

I completely agree with everyone's opinions here. I think that maybe some incidents may be exaggerated. You are right that he should include his failures too.

Thank you for the opinion. Indeed, he should have included his failures. I won't believe that he had no failures at all and everything that he did was a success.

It is true that he has included few of his failures in his personal life such as failing in his marriages. Yet, the world knows him as either a scientist, or a diplomat. So, in that professional fields, definitely he had atleast few drawbacks. And by excluding them from his book, he gives the readers a wrong picture. What I believe is, if his hardships werw also mentioned here, the book will be appealed more by the readers

[Sushan Ekanayake]

Yea, we become the hero of our own story when we tell it. So, we are tend to either add some exaggeration or make the story more dramatic. Apparently that is what has happened here. But I think that the summary of the story is more or less correct

Exactly my thoughts. We tend to tell our own stories with some embellishments which is what the author has done. Who wouldn't. He was successful so it wouldn't be difficult adding some salt like we say it in my place.

I liked your take on this matter. It is easy to exaggerate a bit or gloss over certain topics in a book in order to have a bigger impact on readers. After all, books shape our thoughts and personalities, so authors can use writing and glamorise it in order to have a powerful tool.

Authors can choose whatever they want to write in fiction. But is it same when it comes to autobiographies and memoirs? These are filled with (or supposed to be filled with) true details. Is it ethical to distort data in such a book just to have a bigger impact on readers' minds?

I don't think so. Autobiographies should be written as exactly as happened. It is okay for the author to forget things, unless he maintains a diary. But exaggerating the details or omitting the undesirable content seems unethical. The author can always choose not to reveal sensitive details, yet exaggerations are not acceptable.

[Sushan Ekanayake]

I think a little was exergerated. Many people write biographies to appease the person.

Memoirs can be written to appease the person. But usually no one tries to be a supreme character in his own biography : an autobiography.

But in this book that is happened, and that is whay it feels a bit odd. Seemingly Dr. Berrah had some sense of boasting inherited and maybe that is the reason for him to include few exaggerated points in his autobiography as well. But it makes the book a bit difficult to believe as it is

[lavkathleen]

I completely agree with everyone's opinions here. I think that maybe some incidents may be exaggerated. You are right that he should include his failures too.

He did include his failures. Trying your best to improve other people's lives through politics means you're in the way of the evil people using it for their own gain. He's mentioned his contact with corruption a few times, the difficulties of negotiating and making dialogues and failing at it, being sabotaged by enemies, etc. Did we read the same book?

[lavkathleen]

Yes. While I think Dr Berrah must have been amazing at what he did, there is just no way anyone could be so nearly perfect. It is much easier to believe he embellished some of the narrations. To be controversial or dramatic, I don't know which. But the overall summary of the book must be as close to accurate as possible.

But he wasn't perfect! I could say a bunch of wrong things I found in this book, like his opinions on women, his shortcomings as a public servant, things he couldn't change in their government, his beliefs on global politics, etc. There's so many! I don't know how you all think he's trying to make himself look like a god when all these things can be found in the book.

[lavkathleen]

That is what I think too. As a renowned person in his career, he has no apparent need to lie. So the basic details in this book has to be true. Yet, considering the nature of his work, there has to be atleast minor flaws or failures that he had to face. It is unnatural for one to succeed in every aspect without even a small set back. So, I too think that he has ignored such things and included only the positive parts to make this book more inspirational as well as a dramatic read

He did not ignore them. The book was intended to inspire people and show his work and dreams in the name of peace, so it may seem like the entirety of it was positive. But he didn't ignore the failures and shortcomings. If he did, then we wouldn't have read the fact that after the president died and he retired, their work and country plummeted down when they were replaced by less worthy people. I could list down a handful of things I found wrong in him, too.

[lavkathleen]

Having never heard of him before, I read the book with an open mind hoping to learn about him, and I did. Having said that, I do believe his story. There were exaggerations, but it is his story to tell. He can make it as good as he wants.

He can't make it look good as much he wants. It doesn't matter that this book is personal, he was still part of history. Altering events (especially historically relevant ones) would receive huge international backlash. Therefore, accusing him of making exaggerations is quite a bold thing to say.

[lavkathleen]

I do believe what he has written, at least the factual data. I think that anyone, when looking back at their life, is going to see it through rose-colored glasses that paint themselves to be the hero of their own narrative, but every time I came to an occasion that caused skepticism, when it was something documented or public, it seemed that the facts matched the story. Because of this, after about half-way through the novel, I put my skepticism aside and decided to trust him as a reliable narrator likely to have a very human and therefore understandable bias.

I expect him to recount the stories, at least the historically relevant ones, to be close to a hundred percent accurate. The others, though, I agree that he might tell them with such fondness to the point that they'll come off as dramatic which is understandable. I admire that you read this with open-mindedness and set aside the skepticism when unnecessary.

[lavkathleen]

Well, lets all have in mind that there is one thing the author is very good at — diplomacy. So I believe the author's story and think that some parts of it could have fine tuned for diplomatic purposes. As a diplomat, you won't want your book to start causing some trouble. Would you?

That's an interesting take. It's not far from being possible that he might have kept things to himself for the sake of diplomacy and peace, too. But he did reveal and admit his involvement in sabotaging Fidel Castro's speech at one of their assemblies. That's a brave thing to do considering Fidel Castro was not a big fan of their country since they made it known of their opposition of him.