Chin Peng's memoirs, aptly titled My Side of History , can certainly be ranked as one of three monumental books in recent years that tell the history of Malaysia and Singapore from its great movers and shapers.

The other two are the two-volume autobiography of Singapore's Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew and veteran Malay journalist Said Zahari's Dark Clouds at Dawn - A Political Memoir (Kuala Lumpur, Insan, 2001)

Said Zahari was, like Chin Peng, once a worthy enemy of Lee and his party. Detained without trial for 17 years for being, among others, "a communist", an allegation which he still denies to this day, Said was a reporter who was assigned to cover the 1955 Baling Peace Talk between Tunku and Chin Peng.

Said was then 27 and Chin Peng, 31.

After the Baling Peace Talk failed, Chin Peng went back into the jungle while Said continued to report and write until he was detained in 1963.