African Silences is a spellbinding and sobering journey through Africa's ravaged wildernesses. In 1978 and again in 1986, Matthiessen travelled through Senegal, Gambia, the Ivory Coast, Zaire and the Central African Republic to examine the fate of West African wildlife. African Silences shows Matthiessen at his best, taking the reader on hair-raising flights over forest and savanna, high-speed dashes by car along dirt roads, and slow journeys by river boat and jungle track, to encounter rare and endangered animals - elephants, gorillas and rhinos amongst them - and the wildlife biologists who study and attempt to protect them.
Autorentext
Peter Matthiessen was a naturalist, explorer and writer. His works of fiction include At Play in the Fields of the Lord, Far Tortuga and the acclaimed 'Watson Trilogy'. His explorations resulted in many fine works of non-fiction, among them The Snow Leopard, The Cloud Forest and The Tree where Man was Born. He died in 2014, aged 86.
Klappentext
The skilled naturalist writer is almost as rare as the Congo peacock or the pygmy elephant both subjects of the quest Peter Matthiessen conducts in African Silences. 'Skilled' is almost an insulting understatement for Matthiessen's sharply captivating pros, as he mordantly digs away at the countries of west and central Africa, exposing their physical and moral corruptions in a manner somewhere between Orwell and V.S. Naipaul GARY MEAD, Financial Times
African Silences is a spellbinding and sobering journey through Africa's ravaged wildernesses. In 1978 and again in 1986, Matthiessen travelled through Senegal, Gambia, the Ivory Coast, Zaire and the Central African Republic to examine the fate of West African wildlife. African Silences shows Matthiessen at his best, taking the reader on hair-raising flights over forest and savanna, high-speed dashes by car along dirt roads, and slow journeys by river boat and jungle track, to encounter rare and endangered animals elephants, gorillas and rhinos amongst them and the wildlife biologists who study and attempt to protect them.
Zusammenfassung
African Silences is a spellbinding and sobering journey through Africa s ravaged wildernesses. In 1978 and again in 1986, Matthiessen travelled through Senegal, Gambia, the Ivory Coast, Zaire and the Central African Republic to examine the fate of West African wildlife. African Silences shows Matthiessen at his best, taking the reader on hair-raising flights over forest and savanna, high-speed dashes by car along dirt roads, and slow journeys by river boat and jungle track, to encounter rare and endangered animals elephants, gorillas and rhinos amongst them and the wildlife biologists who study and attempt to protect them.