The Tale of the Terrible Tyrant Told Terrifically

Besides the playful alliteration in my title, I did seriously love this piece of writing. The immense detail Mr. Bowden had that illuminated just how ruthless Saddam could be was fantastic. He also did a great job in showing the fragile human side of Saddam (crying after an execution, hiding his limp, dying his hair, writing novels). I don't know how Mr. Bowden got a hold of all of these sources without any of them remaining anonymous. I would assume that they would be too scared to talk about the infamous tyrant. I knew that Saddam was a ruthless leader, but what I didn't know was that he had a vision of himself being remembered positively for what he did in his country. Quite honestly, I could not put my book down after I started this piece, it was so full on insight on Saddam and I barely noticed the fact that there were only direct quotes form people around Saddam, never from Saddam himself (I can understand why...). I don't know if I have ever read an article with such detail on a subject without the subject ever being quoted. Awesome.