Author(s): Nicholas Rankin

History

The extraordinary life of George Steer, war correspondent. Who was the Special Correspondent whose report shocked the world, galvanised Picasso into painting his black-and-white mural Guernica, and earned himself a place on the Gestapo Special Wanted List? On 26 April 1937, amid the rubble of the bombed city of Guernica, the world's press scrambled to submit their reports. But one journalist held back, and spent an extra day exploring the scene. His investigation, when it came, would point the finger at the secret involvement of the Nazis in the devastating aerial attack. The lead story in both The Times and the New York Times, his was the most controversial despatch of the Spanish Civil War. George Steer, a dapper 27-year-old adventurer, was a friend and supporter of the Ethiopian emperor Haile Selassie I. As a foreign correspondent he foresaw and alerted others to the Fascist game-plan in Africa and Europe; initiated new field propaganda techniques; and saw military action in Ethiopia, Spain, Finland, Libya, Egypt and Madagascar. Without Steer, the true facts about Guernica's destruction might never have been known. In this exhilarating biography, Nicholas Rankin brilliantly evokes all the passion, excitement and danger of an extraordinary life, right up to Steer's premature death in the Burmese jungle on Christmas Day 1944.