Dark Star Safari: Overland from Cairo to Capetown

Gosh this man is arrogant, chauvenistic, self important ...
Can't believe I finished it really. I was only kept going by the places I know well and some of the interesting characters he came across. Glad I didn't come across him in the middle of Africa!

THeroux is probably the best writer of "armchair travel" working today. Get this on audio and listen on a long car journey.

Makes me want to try doing Africa overland. Egypt to Sudan, Sudan to Ethiopia, Ethiopia to Kenya, Kenya to Uganda, Uganda to Tanzania, Tanzania to Malawi, Malawi to Mozambique, Mozambique to South Africa. At my pace, that should take... maybe four months. Anyone else down?

Great book on 'The other Africa'. Not the Africa of Kruger NP, the Serengeti, etc, but Africa where the Africans live. A tough life in most places. And superbly described by Paul Theroux.

Having just returned from southern Africa, lots of his critical observations resonated with me. In many ways the Western world is arrogant in its belief that it can solve African problems simply. We need empowering, non-paternalistic ideas

It was a long read because it is definitely not a page turner. But it was a great book, heroic to read as is Therouxs trip through Africa. How he travels is worth the book, how he describes his travels much more. His wording and his vocabulary make you feel that you are actually there, which is quite a feat, for Africa is the hardest continent to describe.

His opposition against the white Land Rovers feels genuine, but is for me hard to check. His political and cultural kinship with Africa ìs genuine, no need to check.

The best paragraphs are the ones where he talks to people and he does that a lot. The stories of in his coincidental "co-travellers" are what makes this book a must read in the end. As is his travel wit, which makes Africa an assailable continent in the end. As long as you've got the guts and the brains (and some knowledge of 3-4 African languages).

And canoeing the Zambezi with Karsten I will add to my list of to do's...

Paul Theroux is a wonderful storyteller! I couldn't put the book down, until I got to the last few chapters. At the end I just wanted to throw the book away and not finish it. His description of South Africa is simply ridiculous. I don’t know where he got his information from, but his historical ‘facts’ are mostly wrong. Since when was Dingane the ‘son and successor” of Shaka Zulu? Dingane was in fact Shaka’s half brother who got Shaka murdered.Theroux also claims that the British were in the Cape before the Dutch. He is correct in saying that the Dutch were not the first Europeans to settle at the Cape, but it was not British but the Portuguese who ‘discovered’ the Cape for the Europeans. And how can he possible describe the Democratic Alliance as a political party for the ‘right wing’ white people in South Africa? The DA is by far more multi-racial than the ANC and there are other political parties that cater much more for the ‘right wing’ Afrikaners.

I am South African myself, so I know much more about South Africa than any other country in Africa. I just wonder whether his opinions abouth the other African countries are just as misguided. Or did he reserve all his judgements for South Africa?

I enjoyed the book, although towards the end, I felt Theroux's objectivity towards Africa had completely disappeared, and that his overwhelming negativity and blame for the continent's problems were flung in all directions, without proposing any sort of solution for the questions he raised.

A great book that not only documents his trip but discusses the problems associated with 'aid' and how it is big business and produces laziness and dependence.

I really loved this book--I read it while I was in Tanzania, one of two great travel books for Africa that I read there--it is beautiful and terrifying at the same time.