5.0 out of 5 stars
An expert memoir of 1970’s equatorial Africa.
Craig Harrison’s “Dreams of a Vanishing Africa” is a superb travel memoir. Harrison is a smooth, capable writer. Most of all though, he possesses the skills demanded by top level travel writing: Keen eyes, ears, olfaction and a continuing sense of rhythm and tone for the road. All the “heavy hitters” of overall travel writing possessed this, e.g. Sir Richard Burton, D.H. Lawrence in his “Sea and Sardinia” and the inimitable Mark Twain in “Innocents Abroad”. Harrison has a firm understanding of these and many more, especially those main stays of Africa writing.
He traveled in 1971 on a “shoe string”, zig-zagging through equatorial Africa, west to east to north, speaking generally. He did so mostly with companions, though sometimes alone. In traveling on the “shoe string”, he employed extremely inexpensive forms of transportation into and out of some of the most extremely fly-blown, ugly villages, towns and cities; this was done in countries that have now changed their names. However he did this to take in the other extreme—some of the most beautiful and bountiful country on this planet.
A fine ornithologist, Harrison shares this background with us all the way, including the mammals as well. Also versed in geography and ethnography of Africa, he puts the natural world of Africa all together for the reader. If there is one weakness in this book he was very polite and kind when writing about incompetent governments (using the term loosely) and their representatives. Other travel writers, such as the caustic Paul Theroux, would later have burned their skins off figuratively speaking. There are a few places where Harrison allowed himself to heat up a bit, but most the time he was very British about the heap of screw ups he encountered during his year in Africa, even though very much an American.
Immediately following his year, he went to France and wrote the rough draft of his Africa travels. Though he abandoned them for decades, “Dreams of a Vanishing Africa” is the result after his return to them decades later. Thank goodness for that. I highly recommend this.
