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Children of monsters : an inquiry into the sons and daughters of dictators / Jay Nordlinger.

by Nordlinger, Jay, 1963-

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Encounter Books, c2015.

Dictators -- Family relationships.

Totalitarianism -- Social aspects.

Parent and child.

Children of criminals.

9781594038150 (hc.)

1594038155 (hc.)

1st American edition.

xiv, 266 p. : ill. ; 24 cm.

Includes index.

Hitler -- Mussolini -- Franco -- Stalin -- Tojo -- Mao -- Kim -- Hoxha -- Ceausescu -- Duvalier -- Castro -- Qaddafi -- Assad -- Saddam -- Khomeini -- Mobutu -- Bokassa -- Amin -- Mengistu -- Pol Pot -- Afterword.

"Some years ago, the author, Jay Nordlinger, was in Albania. It was about ten years after the collapse of Communism. For almost 40 years, Albania had been ruled by one of the most brutal dictators in history: Enver Hoxha. Nordlinger wondered whether this dictator had had children. He had indeed: three of them. Nordlinger wondered, "What are the lives of the Hoxha kids like? What is it like to be the son or daughter of a monstrous dictator? What must it be like to bear a name synonymous with oppression, terror, and evil?" Nordlinger surveys 20 dictators in all. They are the worst of the worst: Stalin, Mao, Idi Amin, Pol Pot, Saddam Hussein, and so on. The book is not about them, really, though of course they figure in it. It's about their children. Some of them are absolute loyalists. They admire, revere, or worship their father. Some of them actually succeed their father as dictator -- as in North Korea, Syria, and Haiti. Some of them have doubts. A couple of them become full-blown dissenters, even defectors. A few of the daughters have the experience of having their husband killed by their father. Most of these children are rocked by exile, prison, and the like. Obviously, the children have some things in common. But they are also individuals, making of life what they can. The main thing they have in common is this: They have been dealt a very, very unusual hand. This book investigates those lucky, or unlucky, few. Jay Nordlinger is an editor of National Review magazine"--Provided by publisher.

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