THE response to the publication of Washington Post correspondent Keith Richburg’s book Out of America: A Black Man Confronts Africa, which provides a dramatic depiction of the suffering and brutality of our continent, has been heated and acrimonious. Though this extract first appeared in the Post two years ago, the fury of the debate has largely passed South Africa by. We publish it as a contribution, albeit an uncomfortable one, to our own debate about reaching out to the continent around us.