Triumph of the shoeless superstar - The Guardian - July 27, 2008

It turns out that celebrated Ethiopian runners can join the list of things that share similarities with (pre-Livingstone) London buses. You wait the better part of half a century for a biography of Abebe Bikila, the marathon runner who, in Rome in 1960, became the first black African to win an Olympic gold medal (an event etched into many people's memories because he ran the race without shoes), and then suddenly you have two.

First out of the blocks was Paul Rambali's Barefoot Runner, which was shortlisted for the William Hill Sports Book of the Year in 2006 but is only now being released in paperback. This is an ambitious and evocative dramatisation that seeks to locate Bikila's achievements within the turbulent times in which he lived (for example, the symbolism of his first Olympic triumph taking place in Italy, which under Mussolini had annexed Ethiopia just 25 years before). There are walk-on parts for Nelson Mandela, the black power movement and a menacing cameo from His Imperial Majesty Haile Selassie, the Lion of Judah.

Now we also have Bikila: Ethiopia's Barefoot Olympian, a more journalistic effort which promises to tell 'for the first time' the true story of a humble man who was at one time, arguably, the most famous black African in the world. Written by foreign correspondent Tim Judah, the book is based on contemporary news reports and interviews with the friends and families of both Bikila and Onni Niskanen, the maverick Swedish trainer who spotted and developed the runner's potential. Judah did the bulk of his research in the late Nineties, so one can only imagine how he felt two years ago when he walked in to Borders and saw Rambali's book on the shelves. Read More.