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Dark Star Safari: Overland from Cairo to Capetown | 
 enlarge | Author: Paul Theroux
Publisher: Mariner Books
Category: Book
List Price: $15.95
Buy Used: $4.75
You Save: $11.20 (70%)
New (33) Used (37) from $4.75
Avg. Customer Rating:  63 reviews
Sales Rank: 23293
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 496
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.1
Dimensions (in): 8.3 x 5.4 x 0.8
ISBN: 0618446877
Dewey Decimal Number: 916.04329
EAN: 9780618446872
ASIN: 0618446877
Publication Date: April 5, 2004
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Condition: minor use wear; fast shipping
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Product Description
In Dark Star Safari the wittily observant and endearingly irascible Paul Theroux takes readers the length of Africa by rattletrap bus, dugout canoe, cattle truck, armed convoy, ferry, and train. In the course of his epic and enlightening journey, he endures danger, delay, and dismaying circumstances. Gauging the state of affairs, he talks to Africans, aid workers, missionaries, and tourists. What results is an insightful meditation on the history, politics, and beauty of Africa and its people, and "a vivid portrayal of the secret sweetness, the hidden vitality, and the long-patient hope that lies just beneath the surface" (Rocky Mountain News). In a new postscript, Theroux recounts the dramatic events of a return to Africa to visit Zimbabwe.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 58 more reviews...
 One of his best. May 2, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Consider what it is like to live with an exceptionally well-developed appreciation of your own flimsy mortality and insignificant standing in this strange and dangerous place we call the universe. Throw in a morbid and febrile imagination prone to generating 'what is the worst that can happen' scenarios, as well as a horror and fear of insects and parasites of all kinds, and you will not be surprised to learn that I prefer to do most of my travelling by book from the comfort of my favourite armchair, to the strains of my favourite ECM cds, within sight of a purring cat, or perhaps a blizzard or sunset out my front window. The authors I most like to travel with in books are Paul Bowles, Redmond O'Hanlon and Paul Theroux.
Prior to 'Dark Star Safari', I had read 'The Happy Isles of Oceania', 'Riding the Iron Rooster', and 'The Pillars of Hercules', all of which I enjoyed immensely. There is so much in a Theroux travel book. As you travel through an area with the author you get levels of fascinating history, sometimes through the eyes of famous prior travellers, such as, in this book, Flaubert and Rimbaud -so you come away learning much about them that you didn't know, plus getting the benefit of the historical comparison in settings. And things certainly have changed a lot in Africa from colonial times to now.
Theroux's comments about other travellers are always entertaining and frequently edifying, p.35,
'Wealthy people too lazy to read love cruises for the anecdotal history and archeological chats, which they use to one-up their listeners in boasting bouts after they go home. The Nile cruise passenger is someone in the process of becoming a licensed bore.'
I love the picky little details he will give at times about people who get on his nerves. These people would bother me too. Take these two encountered on a bus from Nelpruit, South Africa, to Maputo, Mozambique, p. 318,
'Two Indian men in skullcaps hogged the four seats in the front row of the top level. The men had pulled off their shoes and sat cross-legged, and the pong of their cheesy feet filled the upper deck.'
There is such variety is this book. Variety in mode of travel, from river cruise to dugout boat, from chicken bus to air-conditioned coach showing movies, from sheep truck to luxury train. Theroux only had to take a plane once on his entire journey, and that was because there was absolutely no other way of getting out of Sudan and continuing on his way. Some of Theroux's modes of travel go beyond risky to being frankly dangerous.
This is a grim book in parts, but then Africa is a grim continent. We only have to consult the headlines, which Theroux satirizes throughout the book, headlines like -'Hundreds Drown in Ferry Disaster', 'Hundreds Die As Soldiers Riot', and that favourite signoff of grim faced cable news reporters, 'And These Are the Lucky Ones.' Today, as I write this review, the headline is 'Nine Die In Luxury Bus Crash In Egypt'. There are long-term crises, imminent crises threatening to boil over, and immediate crises calling for emergency aid. Africa doesn't seem to be working, and reading this book you get an idea of why.
Theroux, with his lifetime of exotic travel experience, his top drawer literary connections, his political connections, his scholar's knowledge of history, geography and biology, and his overall drive, smarts, and lust for life, has offered up a special treat in 'Dark Star Safari', the sort of miraculous concoction I doubt that anyone else is capable of. What other book allows you to spend time with Naguib Mahfouz and Nadime Gordimer, feed hyenas at night on the outskirts of Harar, get shot at on a lawless road in Northern Kenya, visit spectacular Egyptian ruins with platoons of other tourists or alone far off in the deadly desert, debate with obnoxious evangelists (Africa is thick with them and Theroux can talk rings around them), reminisce with the Prime Minister of Uganda, take a cruise across Lake Victoria, fraternize with a myriad of wonderful, exotic wildlife, and travel the length of beautiful, dangerous Africa, top to bottom, the hard way, all the while meeting innumerable interesting characters, and hearing their stories, under impromptu, usually uncomfortable circumstances? Highly recommended.
Nkosi Sikelele Africa January 25, 2008
I read this book while driving from Johannesburg to the equator and back. It was therefor very immediate for me. I normally find Paul Theroux a bit tedious but certainly not this one. His desciptions are compelling and he brings to life all the awful, sad things about Africa. I fear that this beautiful continent, with it's wonderful people will never be able to overcome their problems.
dis goode and bitter book, mon November 15, 2007
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
mon, dat Paul Theroux--he like de old friend commin to your door after longtime and you be wonderin "which one showed up, mon--de Jekyll or de Hyde?" de Jekyll, oh my stars, mon, he be de followin: bitter, cantankerous, unforgivin, ruthless in he shrewd assessments, mon, of de characters of de characters (all over de world, not just de Africa) he meets and not so much interviews but interrogates. nothin escape dis Jekyll's scrutiny. no wonder he such long long friends wich de nasty but brilliant V.S. Naipaul--annodder writer you need read, methinks.
however, mon, de Mr. Hyde in de Mr. Paul, he be a poet of de first water, mon--de flights of he prose soar de stratosphere: descriptions of de sunsets, de trenchant perceptions about world aid to Africa, his sensa humour, mon--i like to smoke one blunt wich dis guy, mon.
but he a dangerous guide; you have he cadences in your pumpkin-noggin for de LONG time. like de words of dat ticklish-pricklish friend i tell you about.
you mun go read de Theroux, mon. read anyting by he. but dis be one de best of a very heavy canon.
peace, mon.
Dark Star Safari November 14, 2007
After reading Theroux's observations about Africa from the 60's and current years, I better understand the harm that the foreign aid givers are doing to African's motivation to be self sufficient!
 Through the mud, dirt, and and indifference of Africa... November 12, 2007
This book feels like it was written by a sadist for the benefit of armchair masochists. Theroux sounds like he was a ganja-smoking hippie living and working in Africa back in the 60s, so he is taking a nostalgic bad trip down memory lane. He decides to travel from one end of the continent to another, but eschews the comfort, speed, and safety of flying to be able to go by every other grimy, stinking, dangerous conveyance imaginable. Kind of like a dirty African version of "Planes, Trains and Automobiles". The more ugly and uncomfortable the travel is, the more he seems to enjoy it. He tells us how many African countries have sunk further down into poverty, laziness, and ill health since his last visit, and he blames this deterioration in great measure to the efforts of various do-gooders, such as pious missionaries and pompous foreign aid workers. He reminds one of Rush Limbaugh's characterization of the creation of an American dependency class by ill-founded welfare programs. This may be true, but it is depressing reading for a person looking for an enjoyable travel book.
Fortunately, Thoroux doesn't take his wife or any family members on this painful, ugly journey. He seems to be following a philosophy made famous by Greta Garbo in one of her movies: "I vant to be alone!" He took great pleasure in being out of touch and unreachable during most of this trip. He succeeded in this effort, and it wouldn't be a great loss if this book received the same fate.
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