Supreme Leader: The Biography
As nuclear negotiations remain stalled and ominous signs gather like storm clouds over the Korean Peninsula, the world might once again find itself with no choice but to pay attention to the 35-yearold Supreme Leader of North Korea. Fortunately,
Kim Jong Un is no longer the enigma wrapped in a mystery that he was in 2017, before he met with five foreign heads of state and embarked on nine visits outside his isolated country.
The Great Successor is the first serious attempt at a biography of the no-longer hidden Kim. Anna Fifield distills her intrepid reporting from both sides of the DMZ for The Washington Post since 2014, adding dogged research on Kim’s formative years before he took over North Korea in 2011. She tracked down anyone who met the Supreme Leader, from exiled relations in the US to the Japanese sushi chef who knew him as a boy. She loitered around the school he attended in Switzerland, chasing down every scrap of information and insight into what made him into his father’s choice for heir. New details emerge on extraordinary episodes like Dennis Rodman’s sports diplomacy visits to Pyongyang and Wonsan (where Kim showed off his now well-known equestrian skills).
Yet much remains unknown about Kim and the internal workings of North Korean politics. He is also relatively young, with potentially decades of rule ahead of him. It is too early for a definitive biography. But Fifield puts key pieces of the puzzle together, contributing an important first-draft of history.