Dark Star Safari: Overland from Cairo to Cape Town

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Paul Theroux's books include Dark Star Safari, Ghost Train to the Eastern Star, Riding the Iron Rooster, The Great Railway Bazaar, The Elephanta Suite, A Dead Hand, The Tao of Travel and The Lower River. The Mosquito Coast and Dr Slaughter have both been made into successful films. Paul Theroux divides his time between Cape Cod and the Hawaiian islands. Theroux is best at shorthand dissections of trends that have already become obvious. In no other book will one find such entertaining and penetrating comments about the ironies, as well as the historic failure, of foreign aid.

Writing of more recent events in the history of the region, Theroux describes the outcome of war between Eritrea and Ethiopia as "ending triumphantly for Eritrea". This exceeds even Eritrean government rhetoric; the war, which left tens of thousands dead and no discernible gain for either side, was a disaster for both countries. Mostly, however, this book is an intelligent, funny, and frankly sentimental account by a young-at-heart idealist who is trying to make sense of the painful disparity between what Africa is and what he once hoped it might become." - Gail M. Gerhart, Foreign Affairs I'm not an aid worker, but I was working in Kenya myself at about the time Theroux passed through. And I have a four-wheel drive, though it's neither new nor shiny. Would I have given him a ride? Maybe. But if he started ranting on about aid workers the way he does in this book, I would have had to suggest that he quieten down and do some research.

What criticisms of America does Theroux encounter along the way? How does he answer the critics ... how would you answer them? A conversation with a landmine specialist in Khartoum leads him to state that "not much has been written on the subject of landmines". Can he live a life so removed from the world that he has completely missed the international campaign against antipersonnel mines, a campaign that has produced acres of reportage and dozens of books and which culminated in the Landmine Ban Treaty of 1998, the best-known piece of international legislation of recent times? How does Theroux present some of the countries of Africa? What does he mean when he says, for instance, that Kenya "seemed terminally ill"? Maybe he just felt down-beaten by being a lone traveler constantly vigilant to his surroundings and fending off predators (beggars, thieves, prostitutes) who would congregate around him. He responded at times aggressively when they called him mzungu (white man). He stayed in some rather dismal hotels. But what did he expect? Thus the Africa described in The Last Train to Zona Verde turns out to be an even harsher, more miserable, more depressing place than the one depicted in its predecessor Dark Star Safari. There have been "few improvements, many degradations," the author notes. And in the end, it all proves too much.

Theroux’s book isn’t a total festival of misanthropy. He visits old friends (he was in the Peace Corp), makes new friends, hangs out with hookers, and generally appreciates the pace, beauty and “otherness” that is Africa.He was rather a timid traveller but an energetic writer, a paradoxical soul. At his best he was brilliant. But he travelled very little, saying "It's a full-time job being a drug addict." As Theroux-watchers will know, his sub-Saharan travelogues read as if he had taken Binyavanga Wainaina’s sarcastic instructions on “How to Write About Africa” literally. He is, as the sharp-eyed blog Africa Is a Country remarks, “so reliable that way”. He mints generalisations and insults at such a clip that they soon begin to outstrip even the most gifted parodist..." Firstly, in Dark Star Safari the travel was not all by train. This meant there was more to write about. In his other books (which I also enjoyed - don't get me wrong), there is only so much he can describe about the train itself, and the method of travel. This book opened the door for more descriptive writing about travel method. Theroux, one suspects, could be a headache to travel with; resourceful, courageous and indefatigable, as well as crusty, opinionated and contradictory, he's at once too much and not enough. But listening to him recount his adventures (...) is another matter. He can make you forget to eat, this man. (...) Theroux's energy is infectious, his curiosity omnivorous, his audacity, well, remarkable." - Mark Slouka, San Francisco Chronicle Readers grew tired of Theroux partly because he was always such a shatteringly miserable travelling companion. No place was so exotic that it failed to bore him to tears. Here, though, in his latest journey, he actually enjoys himself, and as a result the prose leaps to life like a mosaic splashed with water. (...) Even the ills of a continent, though, can’t keep this book down. Theroux is, quite simply, a marvellous writer (of course, it never is simple really)." - Sara Wheeler, The Spectator

Perhaps it's meant to keep attention on the places where Theroux did travel, but given that these places do at least find some mention it might have been useful to point them out to curious readers here.) Is Paul Theroux a good travel guide? Did you enjoy traveling with him in his book? Would you enjoy traveling with him in person? Dark Star Safari, a newly formed group featuring Jan Bang, Erik Honoré, Eivind Aarset and Samuel Rohrer, present its eponymous recording debut, an evocative song-driven album. These songs conjure shadows of memory, clouds of dreaming and silhouettes of foreboding through the album’s layered, many-textured fabrics and Jan Bang’s silken delivery of Erik Honoré’s acute lyrics. Then,it's on to Uganda,where he had lived in his youth.It's relatively stable.Tanzania is poor,and travelling by train there is very unpleasant.In Zambia,everyone seems to be infected with AIDs,as girls as young as ten are forced into prostitution. The dangers of road travel are also amusingly recounted, with Theroux frequently mentioning the newspaper headlines of yet another senseless mass-death in some overcrowded vehicle (and occasionally, as he careens down some road or considers whether or not to risk life and limb on a bus again, he pictures himself figuring in such a headline too).I really was captivated by many of the anecdotes, observations and conversations that this rather curmudgeonly and misanthropic author had with the wide diversity of people and landscapes that he encountered. He can have a very dark humour. He points out how life is so different in the various countries he journeys across. We are made very aware of the distinctions across this vast continent. Despite the negativity there is a certain humanism that surfaces from time to time. Theroux is at his best when he can maintain a neutrality from his subject matter.

Several of his books have been filmed (including The Mosquito Coast) and a TV series was made of his stories, The London Embassy and The Consul's Files. Theroux's peevish passages on aid set the tone of Dark Star Safari, but they are not its main drift. (...) There are compelling episodes, when the author's prejudices melt away and the spirit of place asserts itself. (...) There's nothing dishonest in Theroux's account. It is frequently diverting and sometimes moving. His journey through the continent was long and hard and one can admire him for it. No one could accuse him of not doing the footwork. But he should have done a lot more homework." - John Ryle, The Guardian There's probably a good case to be made that Dark Star has a negative or pessimistic (insufficient positive thinking!) outlook. In fact, I would not be surprised to encounter some readers of Dark Star Safari who would like to dismiss the book entirely. Theroux is not very charitable with the charity workers he encounters, though I will admit that I was also surprised by the way they treated fellow travelers, even travelers in danger of being stranded in a desert full of bandits. He meets and is disgusted by missionaries who offer help to the desperate on the condition that they accept Jesus as their personal savior. He also reads Conrad's Heart of Darkness twelve times during the trip, which is not a very sunny novel. Every country seems to be introduced from the perspective of a famous westerner (Rimbaud, Mr. Livingston I presume, Mr. Kurtz...). Even the title "Dark Star Safari" is meant to suggest that for Theroux, Africa is a dangerous wilderness that he will use to escape the center (the West). This is probably for the best -- much of travel is quite boring (and repetitive -- one bus ride much like the next) -- but it's surprising how little sense of the actual hardship of travel Theroux is able to convey.

Eventually, however, the charm escapes him, and the trip becomes a nightmare. What are some of the dangers he meets along the way? Why does he continue the trip? The whites, teachers, diplomats, and agents of virtue [his euphemism for aid workers] I met at dinner parties had pretty much the same things on their minds as their counterparts had in the 1960s. They dicussed relief projects and scholarships and africulteral schemes, refugee camps, emergency food programs, technical assistance. They were newcomers. They did not realize that for forty years people had been saying the same things, and the result after four decades was a lower standard of living, a higher rate of illiteracy, overpopulation, and much more disease. Still its emptiness and its isolation: the wild spaces, the great isolation in places like the Congo. Many of these places are still so dangerous that no-one visits. Many parts of Africa have become forgotten, or overlooked. They await a new conqueror, unfortunately. He's described some of his experiences, both in his early novels and in books such as Sir Vidia's Shadow (see our review).