Dark Star Safari: Overland from Cairo to Cape Town
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THE A5 BOOK REVIEWOur favorite travelogue on Africa, Dark Star Safari provides a real window into the real Africa. No sensationalism, no glamorizing, just a true view of the human condition and the realities of this troubled and remarkable area of the world. The author, Paul Theroux, first went to Africa as a teacher for the Peace Corps in the Malawi “bundu” (bush), and now forty years later he decided to return, both to see how life has changed in Africa and to assess the impact of many years of foreign aid. He started in Egypt, then making his way through the Sudan, Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda, ultimately ending the trip in Cape Town, South Africa. For him, the journey is a revelation as he generally finds shocking and devastating change wherever he goes, and he is subsequently critical of the long-term impact of these aid programs. But with that said, his love and admiration for Africa and Africans also shines through.
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The Last Train to Zona Verde: My Ultimate Safari (2013)The Last Train to Zona Verde is the account of a follow up trip that Theroux took to Africa, ten years after the expedition summarized in Dark Star Safari. Even in his seventies, Theroux's thirst for travel is as adventurous as ever, in what he calls “my ultimate Africa safari”. The writing is as compelling as ever, and perhaps one of his most autobiographical. Click here to read our review on The Last Train to Zona Verde.
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A FEW OTHER A5 RECOMMENDED TRAVEL BOOKS FROM PAUL THEROUX (click here for more)
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Paul Theroux is one of the world's most prominent travel writers, and one who deserves credit for shaping and defining the genre. We at A5 love his rich description of people and settings, his wit and his intelligence. He has written numerous travel essays and works of fiction, several of which were turned into movies. See more from Paul Theroux here.
GREAT QUOTES:
“Travel is transition, and at its best it is a journey from home, a setting forth. I hated parachuting into a place. I needed to be able to link one place to another. One of the problems I had with travel in general was the ease and speed with which a person could be transported from the familiar to the strange, the moon shot whereby the New York office worker, say, is insinuated overnight into the middle of Africa to gape at gorillas. That was just a way of feeling foreign. The other way, going slowly, crossing national frontiers, scuttling past razor wire with my bag and my passport, was the best way of being reminded that there was a relationship between Here and There, and that a travel narrative was the story of There and Back.”
- Paul Theroux, Dark Star Safari “That was my Malawian epiphany. Only Africans were capable of making a difference in Africa. All the others, donors and volunteers and bankers, however idealistic, were simply agents of subversion.” - Paul Theroux, Dark Star Safari INTERESTING LINKS:
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