Catch Me a Colobus

by Gerald Durrell, Edward Mortelmans (Illustrator)

A bloom of monkeys...

A big and rather beautiful tree grew a couple of hundred yards from the verandah just below us. There was a crash and a scuffle amongst the leaves. And then, suddenly, it seemed as thought the whole tree had burst into bloom, a bloom of monkeys. They were Red and Black Colobus, and they were the most breathtaking sight.

Another pot-pourri of animal anecdotes, based on hectic days at the author's Jersey zoo and his forays to various corners of the earth to rescue animal species in danger of extinction. - Sunday Telegraph

His best book for some time...only the Marx brothers could do justice to the chimpanzee breakout at Christmas dinner time. - The Times

Cover Illustration: Arthur Robbins

Genres: Nonfiction, Animals, Nature, Biography, Humor, Travel, Memoir

221 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1972

About the author

Gerald "Gerry" Malcolm Durrell was born in India in 1925. His elder siblings are Lawrence Durrell, Leslie Durrell, and Margaret Durrell. His family settled on Corfu when Gerald was a boy and he spent his time studying its wildlife. He relates these experiences in the trilogy beginning with My Family And Other Animals, and continuing with Birds, Beasts, And Relatives and The Garden Of The Gods. In his books he writes with wry humour and great perception about both the humans and the animals he meets.

On leaving Corfu he returned to England to work on the staff of Whipsnade Park as a student keeper. His adventures there are told with characteristic energy in Beasts In My Belfry. A few years later, Gerald began organising his own animal-collecting expeditions. The first, to the Cameroons, was followed by expeditions to Paraguay, Argentina and Sierra Leone. He recounts these experiences in a number of books, including The Drunken Forest. Gerald also visited many countries while shooting various television series, including An Amateur Naturalist. In 1958 Gerald Durrell realised a lifelong dream when he set up the Jersey Zoological Park, followed a few years later by the Jersey Wildlife Preservation Trust.

Gerald was married twice; Jacquie Durrell (1951-1979), Lee Durrell (1979-1995).

Gerald Durrell's style is exuberant, passionate and acutely observed. He died in 1995.

Reviews

[Metodi Markov · Rating 5 out of 5]

С голямо удоволствие чета и препрочитам книгите на Джералд Даръл.

В "Хванете ми колобус" са описани трудностите при запазването на зоологическата му градина и създаването на тръста за опазване на дивата природа на остров Джързи. Включени са и историите от две експедиции за улов на диви животни - в Сиера Леоне и в Мексико.

Научаваме много за живота на гледачите в градината на остров Джързи, както и за този на техните питомци.

Книгата е написана с голямо чувство за хумор и самоирония, чете се буквално за часове. :)

[Sam · Rating 5 out of 5]

Gerald Durrell is an insanely funny writer. I always end up feeling his books are too short! The way he describes his ‘collecting’ trips really brings out his utmost love for all animals and their well-being and protection. He is a truly inspiring person!

[Rebecca · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you’ve never read anything by the late English naturalist Gerald Durrell, you’re in for an absolute treat. I’d recommend starting with The Corfu Trilogy, his hilarious account of growing up on a Greek island in an eccentric family that also included novelist Lawrence Durrell. Yet he is perhaps best known for his wonderfully readable travelogues describing international animal collecting journeys. This is, I think, the third one I’ve read so far, and though they do all follow a similar pattern they don’t become formulaic.

I especially appreciated this one because I had the good fortune to read it while on vacation at Durrell Wildlife Park on the island of Jersey (in the Channel Islands off of France) last weekend. Durrell’s is no standard zoo, but a conservation-oriented center that links captive breeding and work on the ground in native countries in the effort to save endangered animals from extinction. Though there are no colobus monkeys at the zoo today, it does still specialize in primates, with lemurs, gibbons, gorillas and orangutans taking pride of place.

Catch Me a Colobus is a sort of sequel to Menagerie Manor, which chronicled the setting up of Jersey Zoo. Durrell returned from a trip to Australia and New Zealand (the subject of Two In The Bush) to find his zoo close to bankruptcy. He started the Jersey Wildlife Preservation Trust and, between the financial support of donors and his own writing, managed to rescue the zoo. The rest of the book details his trips to Sierra Leone and Mexico (the latter section is a bit shoe-horned in, like he had some leftover material but not enough to fill a whole books on its own), all filled with the same sorts of madcap adventures and quirky characters beloved by readers of his autobiographical works.

His passion for conserving the natural world comes through clearly:

The world is as delicate and as complicated as a spider’s web, and like a spider’s web, if you touch one thread, you send shudders running through all the other threads that make up the web. But we’re not just touching the web, we’re tearing great holes in it; we’re waging a sort of biological war on the world around us…By our thoughtlessness, our greed and our stupidity we will have created, within the next fifty years or perhaps even less, a biological situation whereby we will find it difficult to live in the world at all.

Those words were prescient when the book was first published in 1972, and even more telling now, more than four decades later.

(This review formed part of an article about books for animal lovers on Bookkaholic.)

[Chrisl · Rating 4 out of 5]

This, the first of the Gerald Durrell books I read encouraged finding more his animal collecting stories. That interest wasn't long sustained, but I'm glad to have gotten to know a bit of Durrell's world.

[Lidia · Rating 4 out of 5]

A quién le haya gustado alguno de sus otros trabajos le va a gustar este. Gerald Durrel vivió una vida desde luego que no aburrida primero cuando se mudó con su familia y pasó su infancia en Grecia y luego siendo el director de un zoo y fundación benéfica para la conservación de animales. Aquí narra algunas anécdotas durante este periodo de su vida además de un viaje a México y África para conseguir animales. Recomiendo el autor a todo el mundo, su lenguaje es muy natural y en ocasiones bastante divertido lo que hace que sea siempre un gusto leerle tanto en inglés como en español.

[Danielius Goriunovas · Rating 3 out of 5]

Šmaikštūs pasakojimai iš zoologijos sodo gyvenimo. Turbūt tinkama jaunimui, išreiškusiui susidomėjimą būt veterinoriais ar zoo sodo prižiūrėtojais.

[Marcelina]

Niesamowite, ile błędów, które nawet Word podkreśliłby na czerwono, może znaleźć się w książce mającej zaledwie sto siedemdziesiąt stron. Wydawnictwo Noir sur Blanc ma powód do wstydu.

[Irene Goodfellow]

No iba a hacer comentario del libro, pero todos son jajas de las peripecias del dueño de un zoo hasta que te planta al final un discurso tan sincero y emotivo sobre la importancia de conservar la fauna y flora que cambia completamente el contexto de la novela y veticina un sombrío destino a la Naturaleza por la acción directa e indirecta del hombre. Te deja con un sabor amargo en la boca.

Es el segundo libro que completo de este naturalista y sin duda no el último que pienso leer.

[Manuel Alfonseca · Rating 3 out of 5]

ENGLISH: This is the second time I've read this book, 46 years after I read it first. About half the book tells anecdotes about his zoo in Jersey; the other half describes two of his expeditions: to Sierra Leona, to catch the colobus, and to Mexico, to save a species in danger of extermination: the Popocatepetl rabbit.

I have enjoyed this second reading rather more than the first.

ESPAÑOL: Esta es la segunda vez que he leído este libro. La primera vez lo leí hace 46 años. Alrededor de la mitad del libro cuenta anécdotas sobre su parque zoológico de Jersey; La otra mitad describe dos de sus expediciones: una a Sierra Leona, para atrapar al colobo, y otra a Méjico, para salvar a una especie en peligro de exterminio: el conejo de Popocatépetl.

Esta segunda lectura la he disfrutado bastante más que la primera.

[Ruby Denning · Rating 4 out of 5]

I want to be Gerald Durrell

[Iona Stewart · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love Gerry Durrell and all his books, also this one.

Gerry loved animals, and his main aim was to stop the extinction of as many animals as possible by going on expeditions to Africa and South America in order to catch threatened animals and bring them to his Jersey zoo (when this had been established) in order to breed and thus preserve them.

He wrote these wonderful books, not for the love of writing them (in fact he mostly hated it), or to become a famous author, but to finance his animal—catching trips.

Gerry begins each chapter with an example of a hilarious letter or note he has received asking for help or advice.

In the period described in the book Gerry was married to Jacquie.

Caching the animals was the least of Gerry’s problems; afterwards there was the matter of finding food they would eat, and hopefully enjoy, and finding out what on earth to do when they refused to eat anything at all.

Sometimes the animals escaped, went on a rampage and had to be captured again.

If Gerry succeeded in obtaining a couple of a certain species, one of each sex, there was the problem of getting them to like each other, so they would mate.

We are reminded of the fact that animals all have individual personalities, just like we humans.

Gerry is one of the funniest writers I have encountered.

Here’s an example of Gerry’s humour

“He (a Cornish Chough) liked to sit on Jacquie’s shoulder and run his beak delicately through her hair, presumably in the hopes of finding the odd woodlouse or some similar delicacy and one day … he rammed a piece of paper into my ear … presumably some frustrated nest-making attempt …”

He provides us with a few examples showing that the speech of talking birds is not just haphazard parroting, but exceedingly apt.

There was one man who insisted that parrots couldn’t talk at all.

He walked up to a parrot in the room (an African Grey parrot) and said “You can’t talk, Polly, can you?”

“The parrot regarded him for a moment … and said, in clear and unmistakable tones, ‘Kiss my behind’. … The parrot had never used that phrase before and, indeed, never used it again, but it had said it as clear as a bell and there was no getting round it … The man, white with rage, left the party, saying he wasn’t going to stay in a house where guests were insulted.”

I’m sure Gerry loved the parrot getting its own back on the rude, unbelieving man who denigrated its abilities.

I confess to having a similar experience myself, when my daughter and I were discussing Misser, my cat, in her presence. In some strange way the conversation got round to the unlikely topic of whether she could understand French, and I unkindly remarked “how could she, when she can’t even understand Danish (the language we were conversing in). At that Misser promptly jumped over to me and bit me on the finger (and she had never done that before nor did again). Misser thereby proved to me beyond any doubt that she could in fact understand Danish.

The book is filled with absorbing stories and illustrated with a host of animal drawings by Edward Mortelmans showing us the appearance of the rare species discussed.

In short, this is another amusing and informative book by Gerry Durrell, which I highly recommend.

[Priya · Rating 4 out of 5]

Written for my blog, Tabula Rasa.

In this memoir-like book, Durrell has returned from a trip to Australia, only to find his zoo in shambles. In Catch Me A Colobus, he recounts how they set up the Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust, found sponsors and eventually built the zoo back into shape. The first half of the book is a compilation of vignettes expansing about seven years at Durrell's Jersey Zoo. From escaped chimps, pregnant tapirs and bullying parrots to stories of the strange characters that visit the zoo, like a woman who sat on a bird. Durrell and his staff care deeply for their animal cohabitants, which shows how his zoo is a long way off from the cruelty that is commonly seen in such places.

The second half of the book follows Durrell's expedition to Sierra Leone to collect the rare Colobus monkeys and make the eponymous BBC series. The travelogues detail the conservation efforts or lack thereof across the world, the lives of tribals and forest officers, the customs problems Durrell faces when transporting animals across oceans and the difficult job of adapting the wild to a life of captivity. When Durrell speaks about conservation in the final chapters, he speaks with an admirable passion.

"The world is as delicate and as complicated as a spider's web, and like a spider's web, if you touch one thread, you send shudders running through all the other threads that make up the web. But we're not just touching the web, we're tearing great holes in it...

When asked why I should concern myself so deeply, I reply that I think the reason is that I have been a very lucky man and throughout my life the world has given me the most enormous pleasure. People always look at you in a rather embarrassed sort of way when you talk like this, as though you had said something obscene, but I only wish that more people felt that they owed the world a debt and were prepared to do something about it."

Durrell's dedication to his zoo is remarkable. In this pre-internet age, he conducts his research through a vast library of books on flora and fauna. He highlights the shortcomings of most books of science and explains how he combats them by maintaining intricate journals on the behaviour of the animals at his zoo. He also often reaches out to his contacts for assistance, from veterinarians and human surgeons to other zookeepers. Their readiness and the lengths they go to help out say a lot about Durrell himself.

I had read a book in my mother tongue once about a similar conservationist's zoo, and I had a few issues with it. The main problem was, the writer kept attaching human qualities to the animals that made their behaviour a little misleading to the uninformed reader. The leopard threw a tantrum, he would say, and purred to me that he was upset with me. It was cute, but not quite scientific enough, and I kept wanting to remind him that it was a wild animal he was referring to. Durrell, on the other hand, displays his love for animals and their unique personalities quite well, while explicitly reminding the reader not to mistake a chimpanzee for a friendly little pet.

Disappointingly, the book has no pictures, only cartooney illustrations at the beginning of each chapter. An annoying unnecessary addition are some rather absurd fan letters that beg the question - do people put in any thought before they put pen to paper?

But Durrell more than makes up for both shortcomings. He has some engaging writerly tricks up his sleeve. My favourite is how he attaches animal qualities to the humans that populate this book. So we see someone "spread out in his chair like a ship-wrecked giraffe," or another "clung to his bed like a limpet," and we get these profiles of the BBC crew -

"Chris has heavy-lidded, green eyes, which he tends to hood like a hawk when he is thinking, and in moments of crisis retreats behind his nose like a camel. And there was Howard who was short and stocky with dark curly hair, and enormous horn-rimmed spectacles which made him look like a benevolent owl."

Now, I would not have called an owl benevolent myself, but I can totally see it. It is silly and very entertaining, and only the tip of the giant iceberg that is Durrell's warm, endearing humour. The glimpses of his personal interactions with his wife Jacquie and his assistants make him out, perhaps self-flatteringly, to be a thoroughly lovable guy.

Durrell is also pretty good at imagery. I mean, the man can really write. He sees the world with the eyes of an expert, notes even the tiniest of details, and yet, his conversational tone assures that we never feel overwhelmed by factual information. Check out these few passages on Durrell's first sighting of the Colobus monkey. I have never seen a tree or a monkey described with so much care and fascination.

I was standing, looking out over the misty forest, when I heard some noises in the valley just below the house. I knew it was monkeys because there was that lovely sound as they leap into the leaves, like the crash of surf on a rocky shore. They were heading for a big and rather beautiful tree that grew a couple of hundred yards from the veranda just below us. It had a sort of greeny-grey trunk, the leaves were a very vivid green, and it was covered, at this time of year, with bright cerise-pink seed pods about six inches long.

There was another crash and rustle amongst the leaves. And then, suddenly, it seemed as though the whole tree had burst into bloom, a bloom of monkeys. They were red and black Colobus, and they were the most breathtaking sight. They had rich, shining, chestnut-red and coal black fur, and in the morning sun, they gleamed as though they had been burnished; they were magnificent.

When I looked back at the tree, they had all disappeared. As I sat sipping my tea, I remembered a stupid woman I'd met at a cocktail party in Freetown, who'd said, 'I cannot understand why you're going up country, Mr Durrell. There's absolutely nothing to do or see there.' I wish she could have seen those Colobus.

I cannot believe this is the first I have heard of this man. Catch Me A Colobus by Gerald Durrell is a treat for animal lovers, amateur naturalists, ornithology enthusiasts, and pretty much anyone with a liking for wordy English humour.

[Thomas Land · Rating 5 out of 5]

A collection of his tales from across a few years and several expeditions - and the story of how the Jersey Wildlife Foundation (now the Durrell Foundation) was conceived.

It held a darker tone than some of his other books. It still held the love of nature, the enthusiasm of a child in nature, yet with the intelligence and respect that makes his books so unique.

But nearing the end, all is not well. He makes the reader very, very aware of the the dangers of where the human race is headed. And this was in 1972. Since this book was written, and the "Red Book" (Now known as the "Red List") for the International Union for the Conservation of Nature was quite literally a several volumes bound in a red book, with a list of species on the threat of extinction - now having expanded tenfold across a whole database - since this point, 68% of all wildlife has been exterminated. 68% of wildlife has been killed since Gerald gave a stark warning about pollution, the threat of a changing climate with deforestation and habitat loss. His main issue at the time was convincing people conservation was worth while - and yet 48 years later, we are still trying to do the same thing. But this time, trying to convince the governments.

The story he told may seem familiar now, but he saw our species sliding over the precipice and had the foresight to determine what was to come.

I may have rambled a little here - but he is an icon of Natural History. His words ring true even today, and his inspiration lives on.

[Txe Polon · Rating 3 out of 5]

Este volumen no solo narra hechos más tristes (pero inherentes a la labor del conservacionista) que otros del mismo autor, sino que en general el tono es menos humorístico. En general es una obra menos elaborada, y algunos capítulos son más bien malos, careciendo de la unidad que suele caracterizarlos y de la estructura circular que en otros volúmenes convertían los relatos en obras de ingeniería. Los primeros cuatro capítulos son los peores (especialmente malo es "El señor D. y la señora D.", que carece por completo de unidad temática), pero la obra mejora cuando se narran los viajes a Sierra Leona y a México.

[Rita Rau Silva · Rating 5 out of 5]

“ We are like a set of idiot children, let loose with poison, saw, sickle, shotgun and rifle, in a complex and beautiful garden that we are slowly but surely turning into a barren and infertile desert.” - Gerald Durrell

[Tripta · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think this excerpt sums up everything I love about this book in particular, and Gerald Durrell in general. He's like PG Wodehouse. A Wodehouse who loves animals of all shapes and sizes, from Colobus monkeys to police dogs.
'Now,' said Ambrose, 'to show how obedient they are their trainers will tell them to sit where they are, and then the trainers would go to the other side of the studio and you will see how the dogs would obey them.'
The trainers told the dogs to sit, which they did in a panting line, and then walked over to the other side of the studio.
'You see,' said Ambrose, a broad and happy grin on his face. 'Now this dog, here, he's called Peter and he's five years old. This one here is called Thomas and he's four years old...'
At this point the third dog, which had got thoroughly fed up of the whole thing, got up and walked over to the other side of the studio, away from the glare of the lights.
'And that,' continued Ambrose, unperturbed, pointing in the direction in which the dog had disappeared, 'that is Josephine, and she's a bitch.'

[Leore Joanne Green · Rating 5 out of 5]

Gerald Durrell! I have certainly missed his writing. I forgot how well he writes. Funny, flowing, interesting and with a fantastic vocabulary.
I had a bit of a rough time reading about the accidents which happened in the zoo, but it was a terrific book and I finished it so fast.

Great great great!

5.3.07

[Петър Стойков · Rating 5 out of 5]

Приключенията на семейство Даръл продължават и след създаването на зоопарка им на остров Джързи, като заминават за Сиера-Леоне да ловят маймунки.

[Bionic Jean · Rating 3 out of 5]

Durrell's travels in search of exotic animals while he was based at Jersey Zoo.

[kulisap · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.75

my last physical durrell book. hope i could find more in fb marketplace or ig shops huhu

this one started well, giving us a look into the zoo proceedings and the author's struggles in keeping it financially afloat. by the time i got into the animal collecting trips, i guess it was a bit disillusioning to read.

emma marris's book, wild souls, has been ingrained deep in my values that i can't help but think about individual animal lives being stripped off of freedom for the sake of their species. now, i'm not in a black and white mindset. durrell has done so much for wildlife conservation, more than i ever would in my lifetime, and his affection and love for wildlife is always so palpable through his writings. i think the whole animal collecting and zookeeping is a grey area that's tricky to judge, cuz they do help in making people see the significance of wildlife and maybe those people would participate in more conservation efforts. i just wish we could realize the importance of nature & wildlife even without seeing and feeding wildlife up close. i wish i could appreciate and marvel at the beauty of their existence from afar, with them in their natural habitat. i know that's not realistic, especially today. seeing natural habitats destroyed in the name of economic and industrial progress invokes a deep feeling of anguish and grief.

in the last chapter, durrell talked about conservation which i liked. this one is very heavy on conservation message and i appreciate that so much. like every other durrell book, this one has a lot of fun anecdotes and the author is so good at sharing stories of silly events and silly people. it's a good balance of fun animal stories and important wildlife/nature narrative.

what's really sad is that this was written half a century ago and we're now facing even worse ecological collapse and threat of species extinction that durrell had in his lifetime. i think we really need to reflect over our view of animals in general, starting with poultry animals being mistreated to supply the meat demand. recently, 18 thousand cows burned to death at a dairy farm. yesterday, 5 horses died at the grand national. we need to humble ourselves down. we are not superior species. if we don't learn, it's gonna be our doom.

[Pi]

Gerald Durrell, odkąd poznałam jego pióro, stał się moim ulubionym "słonecznym" pisarzem. To niepoprawny optymista, który tym swym optymizmem zaraża każdego, kto tylko da mu na to szansę. Zawsze, ale to zawsze, po przeczytaniu choćby rozdziału ja jakiejś jego książki - czuję się lepiej, czuję się podniesiona na duchu. Nie inaczej sprawa ma się ze ZŁAPCIE MI GEREZĘ... choć bezwzględnie numer jeden na mojej durrellowej liście zajmuje wspaniała Trylogia z Korfu (ogromnie polecam).
Ta niepozornych rozmiarów książka (ZŁAPCIE PI GEREZĘ), dostarczyła mi wspaniałej zabawy. Jest w niej to, co zawsze odnajduję u Geralda - humor, radość z życia, pasję, energię, słońce, uśmiech, troski, które autor potrafi przekuć w sukces (i nadal nie wiem, jak on to robi). Tak jak każda książka Durrella, tak i ta jest autobiograficzna, jest dziennikiem, zapisem jego niezwyklej codzienności.
ZŁPCIE MI GEREZĘ skupia się na rozwoju jego, istniejącej do dzisiaj, fundacji, która oczywiście jest także ogrodem zoologicznym. Marzę o takim szefie, o kimś tak dobrym, że aż szalonym. O kimś, przy kim nie da się nudzić, ale też nie można się długo martwić. Zawsze docenia swoich współpracowników, ma w sobie pokorę, uczy się cały czas i przede wszystkim - chce się uczyć, chce słuchać i chce ponad wszystko WIDZIEĆ ŚWIAT.
- Co to za świnia? - spytałem.
- Nie jestem pewny, ale chyba nazywa się świnią rzeczną.
- Wielkie nieba! To cudownie!
Ten krótki fragment dobitnie pokazuje, jak pozytywną osobą Durrell był. Za każdym razem, gdy sięgam po jego przygody, mam ochotę zacząć własne. To własnie takie książki, taki człowiek - inspirujące, inspirujący... Nad lekturą jego pamiętników, jego książek nie ma co się zastanawiać - to czysta radość. On też miał problemy... duże problemy finansowe - ale się nie poddał i z uśmiechem sięgał po następny dzień.
Warto zaznaczyć, że Noir Sur Blanc naprawdę ślicznie wydaje pozycje Durrellów. Okładki są tak samo optymistyczne, jak treść. Bardzo polecam - na poprawę nastroju, na gorszy dzień, na chwilę przyjemności i oderwania się od szarości codzienności.

przyjmę każdego
Noir Sur Blanc
egzemplarz recenzencki

[Sean Gee · Rating 5 out of 5]

When David Attenborough assures us of a man that “the world needs him,” that is reason enough to consider opening some of his written works and understand why. The man in question being Gerald Durrell, British naturalist, conservationist, and writer.

First published in 1972, Catch me a Colobus is a rich painting of Gerald’s work both at the Jersey Wildlife Preservation Trust (his zoo, now named the Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust) as well as his expeditions abroad to Sierra Leone and the Popocatépetl volcano region in Mexico. Catch me a Colobus was Durrell’s 17th published work across a mixture of fiction and non-fiction. This means, for the reader of Catch me a Colobus, you have not only the wealth of Durrell’s naturalist experience but also an incredibly expert writer who rides a line of deeply informative writing composed in authentic prose that is filled with Durrell’s own voice.

Catch me a Colobus picks Durrell up on his return to the Jersey Wildlife Preservation Trust from a previous expedition. This throws up the challenges that we all experience when returning to work after a period away. However, the difference being as opposed to a mountain of emails Gerald is faced with fears for his animal's health, habitats in need of repairs leading to an unexpected guest at Christmas dinner, and life and death matters of animal childbirth. Having dealt with these things the real beauty of the book comes out as Durrell travels to Sierra Leone in search of the Colobus Monkey after which the book is named. The time spent in the Trust is filled with anecdotes that are eye-opening to the realities of trying to conserve exotic endangered animals. In contrast, the pages devoted to the missions searching for, collecting, and safely managing the return of animals including the Colobus Monkeys and a pair of leopards blur the lines between naturalist travel writing and adventure novel. The plot follows Durrell returning from Sierra Leone, getting the new inhabitants settled before setting off yet again, this time to Mexico in search of a rare Volcano Rabbit.

Gerald Durrell’s writing is both incredibly simple and conversational which creates such a human feeling in his storytelling while at the same time his use of deeply involved metaphors transports the reader to the jungles of Sierra Leone. Lines such as “our view stretched south over three to four hundred miles of the Liberian border and the whole of which in the early morning looked as though it had been drowned in a sea of milk” puts me right in that moment. I feel as though his metaphors provide a jump-off point from which my mind develops more. The fresh morning air already warm despite the sun only just rising, giving, for a British person, an undeniable sense of being abroad. The sounds of creatures that I could not even guess to what species they are let alone what they look like. The picture he paints in just a few words kicks all my senses into overdrive and sets a clear backdrop for the stories he goes on to present.

While obviously great adventures to faraway jungles in search of rare animals make for excellent reading, as a reader of any material you should always look beyond the text and think about the wider context. In this case in the ’60s and ’70s Sierra Leone was freshly independent after having been “granted independence” by Britain in 1961. So within every interaction that Durrell has with the local people, and despite his undeniably decent motives of protecting species on the verge of extinction, is the presence of colonist undertones. The only characters that are fleshed out to any extent are either those Durrell travels out with or a collection of European and American connections who happen to be in the areas he travels to. This to me represents a serious missed opportunity to introduce local characters who have passion for the creatures they share their country with. However, being aware of the context enables you to read and draw Durrell’s positive message understanding the broader issues that were and still are involved in travel of this sort.

This book is both a beautiful piece of travel writing from an expert naturalist that is an inherently enjoyable read but also a great plea for change. The last chapter entitled ‘Animals for Ever’ is, sadly, no less relevant today than when the book was published in 1972. Particularly worrying is the statement Durrell makes that our world could be irrevocably altered within 50 years. 2022 would mark that 50 year period.

I would highly recommend this book, at just over 200 pages and incredibly readable, all the beauty and lessons to be found are accessible for almost anyone!

[Ondřej Puczok · Rating 3 out of 5]

Knihy Geralda Durrella jsem jako malý miloval a všechny přečetl hned několikrát. Jenže zatímco z O mé rodině a jiné zvířeně si toho dodnes pamatuji mnoho a některé části pro mě zlidověly, "guerézu" jako bych snad předtím až na drobné výjimky neviděl (např. osud vzácných bažantů). Kniha to totiž rozhodně není špatná, člověka baví obě části – jak ta o správě ZOO na Jersey, tak ta o lovu vzácných zvířat – neobsahuje ale pro mě nějaké zásadní kapitoly, které si člověk opravdu zapamatuje. I z toho, co sám autor v knize píše, jde o deník sepsaný a vydaný pro všechny jeho podporovatele v té době a zároveň užitečný zdroj financí. To není špatný cíl, ale logicky pak čtenář v současné době spíše šáhne po ucelenějším kousku, např. po Opilém pralese. A tuzemským čtenářům v té souvislosti velmi doporučuji publikaci Jak se dělá ZOO, která je zaměřena na proměny té pražské za ředitele Petra Fejka.

[Magill · Rating 3 out of 5]

Describing two trips in 1965 and 1968 to Sierra Leone and Mexico, respectively. The first to increase the collections at the Trust and the second to collect two specific species under threat in Mexico. As well as some other anecdotes about the zoo and its animals, sharing the charm and the frustrations of caring for various animals and birds.

And it does leave one convinced that people were as stupid then as they are today.

Just for my own amusement I am including a quote which has nothing to do with animals but about the author's first experience with mexican food. "... Then there were tortillas, which were new to us, a pancake which you could either have in a rather flaccid condition (which I didn't care for) or else fried so that they were thin and crisp like biscuits. With them you ate black beans, and a lovely hot sauce made out of green peppers." Mexican food is so ubiquitous that it is rare to see people experiencing it for the first time with unfamiliar palates and knowledge. It really was a different time in every way. (For time scale, just more than 20 years since the end of WW2.)

[Susann · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is a bit sadder and more fraught than Durrell's other books. His zoo in Jersey is going but bankruptcy hangs over it. With the aid of his Trust, things go better with fundraising. Two animal collecting trips are detailed. The first, to Sierra Leone, to collect two types of colobus monkeys and other fauna; the second to Mexico to obtain the elusive volcano rabbit or teporingo. The tension, myriad items of planning, collecting and keeping the animals alive, and the idiocy of custom forms and officials are hair raising in the extreme. Some horrifying stories of the profligate extermination of species on the border of extinction are heart rending. Durrell was in many ways a lone warrior in creating awareness of what mankind is doing to his fellow creatures sharing the planet and the peril that entails for all of us. And this was written in 1972.

[Irene Lázaro · Rating 4 out of 5]

Como siempre, siendo Gerald Durrell me ha encantado. Probablemente éste haya sido el libro más triste de este autor que he leído porque en él mueren más animales que en cualquiera de los otros que he leído. Aún así, siempre me había preguntado cómo sería ese aspecto de cazar animales y tener un zoo: la posibilidad de la muerte de esos animales. En este libro se entiende muy bien la frustración y el proceso que va detrás: la autopsia, el evitar que vuelva a ocurrir a otras especies... Aún así, también tiene partes divertidas y visitas a parajes exóticos así que es muy interesante. Como los demás libros que tratan del zoo, encontramos animales salvajes más vistosos como leopardos, leones y monos, y eso siempre apetece.

[AuDiggory · Rating 3 out of 5]

3. Difícil de alcanzar el nivel del último libro de Durrell que leí: My family and other animals. Incluso el estilo me parece muy diferente, me pregunto qué papel habrá tenido el traductor.

En "atrápame ese mono", Durrell habla de sus aventuras alrededor del mundo capturando animales protegidos para su santuario en Jersey. Las curiosidades y peripecias forman la mayoría del relato, haciéndolo muy entretenido. El lenguaje acompaña el desenfado de las anécdotas, rozando en varios lugares la falta de rigorosidad científica. El último capítulo me parece un grito sensacional a la conservación, pese que sea ya demasiado tarde.

Durell es un poco el Harry Potter de la protección de la fauna: todo le sale bien gracias a la gente que le rodea y él se queda todo el mérito.

[Javier Sastre · Rating 3 out of 5]

Durrell siempre resulta divertido y entretenido. Por su forma directa y aparentemente sencilla de escribir, con una carga de humor siemore preparada que salta a la vuelta de cualquier párrafo, te mantiene atrapado en la lectura. No es esta, para mi, la mejor de sus desternillantes lecturas pero resultan interesantes todas las peripecias y aventuras que le suceden para mantener en marcha su curioso y entrañable zoo de la isla de Jersey y proteger a las especies en peligro de extinción de cualquier parte del planeta. Es además un alegato a la protección de la naturaleza y una crítica al destructivo modo de vida moderno del ser humano, hecha ya en 1974, y que demuestra su lucidez y anticipación viendo el punto al que hemos llegado en nuestros días.

[Kate · Rating 4 out of 5]

"A bloom of monkeys ...
A big and rather beautiful tree grew a couple of hundred yards from the verandah just below us. There was a crash and rustle amongst the leaves. And then, suddenly, it seemed as though the whole tree had burst into bloom, a bloom of monkeys. They were Red and Black Colobus, and they were the most beautiful breathtaking sight."
~~back cover

Another delectable helping of stories about collecting animals in faraway places ... the customs in foreign airports, the inevitable mechanical breakdowns upcountry, the new friends and the satisfaction of transporting wild endangered animals safely to the zoo. Humorous, poignant -- you'll love this book!

[Adele · Rating 3 out of 5]

Durrell did all he could to promote conservation and educate his readers through his marvellous books to appreciate and respect the world’s animal kingdom. In this book, (first published in 1975) he prophesied that By our thoughtlessness, our greed and our stupidity we will have created, within the next fifty years or perhaps even less, a biological situation whereby we will find it difficult to live in the world at all. . Sadly, I read this in 2022 and it seems that by and large his warning has been given scant heed with climate change now a very clear and present danger. Yet I fear we will never listen, never learn and worse of all not act until it is too late.