My Kenya Days

This book is a little different from Thesiger's other works, primarily because is was a work of dictation rather than writing. Written as a look back across his time in Kenya, Thesiger had by the time this book was created, lost his eyesight, rendering him unable to read or write.

From his first visit in the 1960s until 1993 (this book was published in 1994), Thesiger shares his most prominent memories. They range from explaining some of his many expeditions and travels through Kenya with a variety of persons accompanying him, to his thoughts on animals, anti-poaching and some anthropology around the tribes he spent time with.

As his last book, it contains a lot of his memories and some of his current thoughts when looking back at events, including a few regrets (but none major). He also tells a little about the people he met, both Kenyan and Europeans, and pulls no punches. Amusingly he has a significant dislike for Joy Adamson (although likes her husband George, and spends some time travelling with him) - the Joy Adamson of Elsa the lion fame. He makes one comment suggesting he couldn't understand why her husband didn't take her out and shoot her after she takes George to task rudely in front of guests. Well - he is well within his rights to be a grumpy old man by this point.

Probably the best aspect of this book however, are his well selected and excellent photographs. For me the format was excellent and far superior to a book which assembles all of the photographs in groups, as the end of each chapter brought several pages of photographs relevant to the chapter just read. This is a rare format, and it really adds to the readers experience, although it obviously means the use of higher quality paper throughout, as the leaves don't align to allow photo quality paper amongst the written pages. But I digress from his excellent photographs, which really are excellent - his landscape photography is brilliant, but really his portraits are where he excels. I understand he gifted his collection of photographs to the Pitt Rivers Museum, and many of these are available to view online as a virtual collection HERE, well worth a look.

Thesiger is an author I do my best to pace my reading of - I own a number of his books that i have not yet read, and do my best to resist doing so right away.

For me, this is easily 4 stars, and close to 5. Pushed to 5 due to the photography.

One quick quote, which I think works with Thesiger's grumpy old man humour.

P83: (Boran is the name of a tribe.)
Every night we had been sleeping on the ground, fairly close together, except for one young Boran who was on bad terms with the others and slept by himself a short distance away. In the morning when we woke up we found the tracks of three lion which had prowled around close to where I and my companions had been sleeping, in some places passing between us within a few feet. Lokuyie turned to the unpopular young Boran and said, “You see, even the lions wouldn't go near you.”