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The Zanzibar Chest: A Story of Life, Love, and Death in Foreign Lands
An examination of colonialism and its consequences. “A sweeping, poetic homage to Africa, a continent made vivid by Hartley’s capable, stunning prose” (Publishers Weekly).
In his final days, Aidan Hartley’s father said to him, “We should have never come here.” Those words spoke of a colonial legacy that stretched back through four generations of one British family. From a great-great-grandfather who defended British settlements in nineteenth-century New Zealand, to his father, a colonial officer sent to Africa in the 1920s and who later returned to raise a family there—these were intrepid men who traveled to exotic lands to conquer, build, and bear witness. And there was Aidan, who became a journalist covering Africa in the 1990s, a decade marked by terror and genocide.
After encountering the violence in Somalia, Uganda, and Rwanda, Aidan retreated to his family’s house in Kenya where he discovered the Zanzibar chest his father left him. Intricately hand-carved, the chest contained the diaries of his father’s best friend, Peter Davey, an Englishman who had died under obscure circumstances five decades before. With the papers as his guide, Hartley embarked on a journey not only to unlock the secrets of Davey’s life, but his own.
“The finest account of a war correspondent’s psychic wracking since Michael Herr’s Dispatches.” —Rian Malan, author of My Traitor’s Heart
In his final days, Aidan Hartley’s father said to him, “We should have never come here.” Those words spoke of a colonial legacy that stretched back through four generations of one British family. From a great-great-grandfather who defended British settlements in nineteenth-century New Zealand, to his father, a colonial officer sent to Africa in the 1920s and who later returned to raise a family there—these were intrepid men who traveled to exotic lands to conquer, build, and bear witness. And there was Aidan, who became a journalist covering Africa in the 1990s, a decade marked by terror and genocide.
After encountering the violence in Somalia, Uganda, and Rwanda, Aidan retreated to his family’s house in Kenya where he discovered the Zanzibar chest his father left him. Intricately hand-carved, the chest contained the diaries of his father’s best friend, Peter Davey, an Englishman who had died under obscure circumstances five decades before. With the papers as his guide, Hartley embarked on a journey not only to unlock the secrets of Davey’s life, but his own.
“The finest account of a war correspondent’s psychic wracking since Michael Herr’s Dispatches.” —Rian Malan, author of My Traitor’s Heart
496 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2003
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About the author
Aidan Hartley
8 books21 followersAidan Hartley is a Kenyan/British writer and entrepreneur.
Born in Nairobi, Kenya in 1965, he was educated at Sherborne and studied English Literature at Balliol College, Oxford, going on to the School of Oriental and African Studies, (SOAS) to study African politics and history.
As a foreign correspondent for the Reuters news agency, Hartley covered Africa in the 1990s - wars in Somalia, famine in Ethiopia and genocide in Rwanda. He is the author of The Zanzibar Chest: A Memoir of Love and War, which was short-listed for the Samuel Johnson Prize. He made dozens of television documentaries, most of them for the Channel 4 Television award-winning current affairs series Unreported World and "Dispatches".
In 2013 he retired from mainstream journalism to focus on private business affairs and book writing. Hartley owns a ranch in Laikipia County, Kenya called Palagalan Farm. The conservation property is home to African wildlife species such as lion and elephant and these co-exist peacefully alongside the farm's herd of Boran beef cattle. Hartley is on the executive of the Boran Cattle Breeders' Society of Kenya.
In 2020, while stranded by lockdown in London, he co-founded a successful Covid-testing company, Crown Laboratories Ltd. In 2021 he co-founded Lantern Comitas, a strategic communications advisory with corporate clients across Africa, Europe and the Americas. In April 2022, the company agreed a joint venture with Mexico-based Miranda Partners.
He writes the "Wild Life" column of The Spectator.
Born in Nairobi, Kenya in 1965, he was educated at Sherborne and studied English Literature at Balliol College, Oxford, going on to the School of Oriental and African Studies, (SOAS) to study African politics and history.
As a foreign correspondent for the Reuters news agency, Hartley covered Africa in the 1990s - wars in Somalia, famine in Ethiopia and genocide in Rwanda. He is the author of The Zanzibar Chest: A Memoir of Love and War, which was short-listed for the Samuel Johnson Prize. He made dozens of television documentaries, most of them for the Channel 4 Television award-winning current affairs series Unreported World and "Dispatches".
In 2013 he retired from mainstream journalism to focus on private business affairs and book writing. Hartley owns a ranch in Laikipia County, Kenya called Palagalan Farm. The conservation property is home to African wildlife species such as lion and elephant and these co-exist peacefully alongside the farm's herd of Boran beef cattle. Hartley is on the executive of the Boran Cattle Breeders' Society of Kenya.
In 2020, while stranded by lockdown in London, he co-founded a successful Covid-testing company, Crown Laboratories Ltd. In 2021 he co-founded Lantern Comitas, a strategic communications advisory with corporate clients across Africa, Europe and the Americas. In April 2022, the company agreed a joint venture with Mexico-based Miranda Partners.
He writes the "Wild Life" column of The Spectator.
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July 26, 2024
LA GRANDE DELUSIONE
Una storia bellissima fatta di tante storie, tutte belle.
Hartley è un inglese nato in Kenia, cresciuto in Africa, un mzungu che ha studiato in Inghilterra, giovane reporter per l’agenzia Reuters.
Ama il continente africano, lo conosce, lo gira e rigira. Da giornalista è sul campo a raccontare e testimoniare le crisi economiche umanitarie e militari più importanti degli ultimi due decenni.
La sua famiglia ha alle spalle due secoli di storia coloniale in tutti i continenti, fra i suoi avi ci sono militari, funzionari pubblici, tecnici che hanno vissuto e lavorato in Africa, in Asia, nei Caraibi ecc.
Un carissimo amico del padre ha lasciato un diario del suo lungo soggiorno ad Aden e Hartley parte per ricostruirne le vicende, cercarne la memoria. Una bella storia che intreccia e collega tutte le altre.
Un picaro in Africa, uno zingaro nel senso di un vagabondo, nel senso di un girovago.
Ma Hartley esagera, non ha ritmo, è caotico, a ogni cosa dedica al massimo un rigo e mezzo, affastella nomi date luoghi eventi fatti, esagera col succo e col colore, l'esotico, il pittoresco.
Racconta cento storie tutte insieme, mentre io ne vorrei una alla volta, al massimo due: non mi lascia tempo per riflettere, per assaporare, per memorizzare, un capoverso e sono già sbattuto altrove. È come avere davanti a entrambi gli occhi un caleidoscopio che qualcuno gira troppo in fretta, e mentre dico ‘aspetta’, continua a girare senza sosta.
Ma scrivere è un altro mestiere.
E, appare chiaro, che essere giornalista non ti fa essere automaticamente buono scrittore.
Un vero peccato, una grande delusione, avrebbe potuto essere un'autentica goduria: alla materia trattata darei anche mille stellette, ma al modo come Hartley scrive non se ne può dare più di una.
Caro signor Hartley, anch’io sarei fiero di un albero genealogico come il suo: ma forse nel ripercorrere la storia coloniale del suo paese d’origine, che non può che essere storia d’imperialismo, un tono un pochino matter-of-fact avrebbe giovato.
Una storia bellissima fatta di tante storie, tutte belle.
Hartley è un inglese nato in Kenia, cresciuto in Africa, un mzungu che ha studiato in Inghilterra, giovane reporter per l’agenzia Reuters.
Ama il continente africano, lo conosce, lo gira e rigira. Da giornalista è sul campo a raccontare e testimoniare le crisi economiche umanitarie e militari più importanti degli ultimi due decenni.
La sua famiglia ha alle spalle due secoli di storia coloniale in tutti i continenti, fra i suoi avi ci sono militari, funzionari pubblici, tecnici che hanno vissuto e lavorato in Africa, in Asia, nei Caraibi ecc.
Un carissimo amico del padre ha lasciato un diario del suo lungo soggiorno ad Aden e Hartley parte per ricostruirne le vicende, cercarne la memoria. Una bella storia che intreccia e collega tutte le altre.
Un picaro in Africa, uno zingaro nel senso di un vagabondo, nel senso di un girovago.
Ma Hartley esagera, non ha ritmo, è caotico, a ogni cosa dedica al massimo un rigo e mezzo, affastella nomi date luoghi eventi fatti, esagera col succo e col colore, l'esotico, il pittoresco.
Racconta cento storie tutte insieme, mentre io ne vorrei una alla volta, al massimo due: non mi lascia tempo per riflettere, per assaporare, per memorizzare, un capoverso e sono già sbattuto altrove. È come avere davanti a entrambi gli occhi un caleidoscopio che qualcuno gira troppo in fretta, e mentre dico ‘aspetta’, continua a girare senza sosta.
Ma scrivere è un altro mestiere.
E, appare chiaro, che essere giornalista non ti fa essere automaticamente buono scrittore.
Un vero peccato, una grande delusione, avrebbe potuto essere un'autentica goduria: alla materia trattata darei anche mille stellette, ma al modo come Hartley scrive non se ne può dare più di una.
Caro signor Hartley, anch’io sarei fiero di un albero genealogico come il suo: ma forse nel ripercorrere la storia coloniale del suo paese d’origine, che non può che essere storia d’imperialismo, un tono un pochino matter-of-fact avrebbe giovato.
November 15, 2015
I found this book to be absolutely riveting. Hartley has actually related two tales here, one detailing his quest to shed some light on the circumstances surrounding the death of his father's friend Peter Davey; the other tale relates Hartley's own story from his education abroad to his misadventures as a foreign/war correspondent for the Reuters news agency.
As a journalist, he was dispatched to the world's hotspots: Croatia, Somalia, and Rwanda being foremost in my memory. He broke bread and rubbed shoulders with murderers and generals, nurses and nuns. He has witnessed inhumanity on such a grand scale that it's a wonder that he can even string sentences together today. He has attended far too many funerals for a man his age.
Hartley is African, born in Kenya and residing there to this day, so he can write about events on that continent with a legitimacy that a foreigner might lack. While he may be judgemental, he is compassionately so. He hides nothing from the reader, and relates his own faults and failings as readily as he points out flaws in others. He spares no detail, so the squeamish may be turned off by this book.
The reader will learn some things about journalism and the news networks, or perhaps have their worst suspicions confirmed: what is reported as fact is often untrue or twisted by the network in order to draw viewers or readers. One miracle child pulled from a pile of quicklimed bodies in a mass grave in Rwanda expired that very night, but was reported alive afterward in order to generate interest and retain an audience. When one of a famous actresses' photographers stepped on the arm of a malnourished child, it was kept out of the news as bad publicity.
The book has some flaws, a bit of sloppiness perhaps. The Canadian Royal Air Force he refers to on page 372 does not exist: it's the Royal Canadian Air Force. The way Hartley wrote it makes a proud military unit seem like a subsidiary of the Royal Air Force. And I would love to know what a "short-muzzle" Enfield rifle is (p.416). Presumably he refers to the old SMLE...the "M" stands for magazine, not muzzle!
There are some photos scattered throughout the book, but regrettably none of them are captioned so I was never sure of who or what was in the photo. But while they are a minor annoyance, the flaws do not significantly detract from what is a great book written by a man who was eyewitness to some of the most horrific events in history.
As a journalist, he was dispatched to the world's hotspots: Croatia, Somalia, and Rwanda being foremost in my memory. He broke bread and rubbed shoulders with murderers and generals, nurses and nuns. He has witnessed inhumanity on such a grand scale that it's a wonder that he can even string sentences together today. He has attended far too many funerals for a man his age.
Hartley is African, born in Kenya and residing there to this day, so he can write about events on that continent with a legitimacy that a foreigner might lack. While he may be judgemental, he is compassionately so. He hides nothing from the reader, and relates his own faults and failings as readily as he points out flaws in others. He spares no detail, so the squeamish may be turned off by this book.
The reader will learn some things about journalism and the news networks, or perhaps have their worst suspicions confirmed: what is reported as fact is often untrue or twisted by the network in order to draw viewers or readers. One miracle child pulled from a pile of quicklimed bodies in a mass grave in Rwanda expired that very night, but was reported alive afterward in order to generate interest and retain an audience. When one of a famous actresses' photographers stepped on the arm of a malnourished child, it was kept out of the news as bad publicity.
The book has some flaws, a bit of sloppiness perhaps. The Canadian Royal Air Force he refers to on page 372 does not exist: it's the Royal Canadian Air Force. The way Hartley wrote it makes a proud military unit seem like a subsidiary of the Royal Air Force. And I would love to know what a "short-muzzle" Enfield rifle is (p.416). Presumably he refers to the old SMLE...the "M" stands for magazine, not muzzle!
There are some photos scattered throughout the book, but regrettably none of them are captioned so I was never sure of who or what was in the photo. But while they are a minor annoyance, the flaws do not significantly detract from what is a great book written by a man who was eyewitness to some of the most horrific events in history.
May 21, 2007
To be completely honest, Aiden Hartley, although I envy his travels, is a pompous prick. he wanders around Africa pretending that it is his, and yet knows nothing of the people he lives "with." He hangs out with white people in white bars, and is essentially a whiny ex-pat child even though he was born in Kenya.
And then Ex-pats (of every culture) wonder why everyone hates them; It's because of people like Aiden Hartley.
And then Ex-pats (of every culture) wonder why everyone hates them; It's because of people like Aiden Hartley.
May 3, 2025
The Zanzibar Chest is a remarkable memoir by war correspondent and journalist Aidan Hartley, who was born in Kenya and still lives there. He has fond memories of an idyllic childhood on his family’s ranch in northern Tanzania. His father, Brian, had been sent to East Africa in the 1920s as a British colonial officer, and later returned to raise his family there. When his father died, Aidan inherited a chest containing the memorabilia of a lifetime. In the chest, he found the journals of Peter Davey, his father's best friend, who died in Yemen fifty years earlier. The narrative alternates between Aidan’s own journalistic experiences covering civil wars in Africa for Rueters, and his quest to follow in the footsteps of Peter Davey as a way of reckoning with his own family’s colonial past.
The book provides a vivid description of the life of a war correspondent who obviously loves his work and feels most alive when facing dangerous conditions. He attempts to bring attention to African issues, which he feels the rest of the world regards with indifference. Hartley covered the civil wars in Ethiopia, Somalia, Rwanda, and other parts of Central Africa. His account is amazingly candid, admitting to feelings and behaviors that are not always virtuous and relationships that are not always harmonious. He witnessed hostilities firsthand and came across the aftermath of violence, atrocities, and genocide.
In addition, the book stands as a tribute to the courage of his fellow war correspondents, photographers, and freelancers. Many of his colleagues lost their lives while covering these wars. He tells their stories and later admits how difficult it was to write about the deaths of his friends. The content is at times unsettling, disturbing, compelling and moving. Hartley sprinkles in humor and scenes from brief periods spent away from the wars, which provide readers with relief from the intensity. The writing is lyrical and the author’s love for Africa and its people is evident throughout.
This book is an essential read for anyone interested in African history, the legacy of colonialism, or the psychological toll of bearing witness to the worst aspects of human nature. Hartley’s honesty about both his family's colonial past and the horror he witnessed results in a powerful and memorable read. The book reminds us that understanding history requires examining both personal and collective pasts, however painful that process may be. Even though it contains horrific experiences (which is not something I generally seek out in my reading), it feels so real and raw that I cannot give it less than the five stars it deserves.
The book provides a vivid description of the life of a war correspondent who obviously loves his work and feels most alive when facing dangerous conditions. He attempts to bring attention to African issues, which he feels the rest of the world regards with indifference. Hartley covered the civil wars in Ethiopia, Somalia, Rwanda, and other parts of Central Africa. His account is amazingly candid, admitting to feelings and behaviors that are not always virtuous and relationships that are not always harmonious. He witnessed hostilities firsthand and came across the aftermath of violence, atrocities, and genocide.
In addition, the book stands as a tribute to the courage of his fellow war correspondents, photographers, and freelancers. Many of his colleagues lost their lives while covering these wars. He tells their stories and later admits how difficult it was to write about the deaths of his friends. The content is at times unsettling, disturbing, compelling and moving. Hartley sprinkles in humor and scenes from brief periods spent away from the wars, which provide readers with relief from the intensity. The writing is lyrical and the author’s love for Africa and its people is evident throughout.
This book is an essential read for anyone interested in African history, the legacy of colonialism, or the psychological toll of bearing witness to the worst aspects of human nature. Hartley’s honesty about both his family's colonial past and the horror he witnessed results in a powerful and memorable read. The book reminds us that understanding history requires examining both personal and collective pasts, however painful that process may be. Even though it contains horrific experiences (which is not something I generally seek out in my reading), it feels so real and raw that I cannot give it less than the five stars it deserves.
June 17, 2010
In many ways, this is a 5-star book. Horrifying, inspiring, bloody, real. Once I got sucked in, I wanted to read this book every. single. minute. and at the same time toss aside my peaceful, happy life and do what I already knew that I wanted to do. For me, reading this book was both utterly absorbing and incredibly painful: how could I bear to sit and read when there is SO MUCH going on out there? (Out there, you know, the greater world, adventure, war, sex-drugs-and-rock-and-roll: that familiar joint pull to your chest and gut that good movies and books do so well)
Hartley charts his family history as intertwined with the rise and fall of the old British empire. Throughout, he mixes in his own story: born in Kenya, educated in England (yawn), and finally a war correspondent for Reuters in Africa through the 1990s. You know what that means. (If you don't, here's a start: Famine in Ethiopia. State collapse in Somalia. Genocide in Rwanda. And you know what, it's not Africa, but what the heck, let's through a little bit of Serbia during the Balkan Wars in there too.)
He sees, and does, it all. And writes honestly about it. One of the strengths of this book, aside from engrossing storytelling (Which. Is. Amazing.), is Hartley's brutal honesty when exposing the idiocy of the current international system - news companies, aid agencies, religious organizations, the military (being a Brit, he is naturally hard on the American military -- which is probably 100% deserved as you will see), even the much-revered UN and African Union (formerly the OAU). Oddly enough, he didn't seem quite as realistically critical of the British Empire -- those criticisms seemed much more philosophical to me. But now I'm rambling.
Hartley's good writing is 5-stars all around, up and down. I found the book a bit flawed -- for me, the side story of a family friend in Yemen lacked meaning, his own sort of bragging through the first few chapters, and his family history almost meant I didn't make it to the meat of the book: Hartley's adult life. I wanted to tear through sections in haste so I could get back to what I liked. I must admit, however, that the book is almost even more lovable because of this. It becomes more real.
Hartley charts his family history as intertwined with the rise and fall of the old British empire. Throughout, he mixes in his own story: born in Kenya, educated in England (yawn), and finally a war correspondent for Reuters in Africa through the 1990s. You know what that means. (If you don't, here's a start: Famine in Ethiopia. State collapse in Somalia. Genocide in Rwanda. And you know what, it's not Africa, but what the heck, let's through a little bit of Serbia during the Balkan Wars in there too.)
He sees, and does, it all. And writes honestly about it. One of the strengths of this book, aside from engrossing storytelling (Which. Is. Amazing.), is Hartley's brutal honesty when exposing the idiocy of the current international system - news companies, aid agencies, religious organizations, the military (being a Brit, he is naturally hard on the American military -- which is probably 100% deserved as you will see), even the much-revered UN and African Union (formerly the OAU). Oddly enough, he didn't seem quite as realistically critical of the British Empire -- those criticisms seemed much more philosophical to me. But now I'm rambling.
Hartley's good writing is 5-stars all around, up and down. I found the book a bit flawed -- for me, the side story of a family friend in Yemen lacked meaning, his own sort of bragging through the first few chapters, and his family history almost meant I didn't make it to the meat of the book: Hartley's adult life. I wanted to tear through sections in haste so I could get back to what I liked. I must admit, however, that the book is almost even more lovable because of this. It becomes more real.
October 29, 2013
Classic, absolutely classic memoir of a very fulfilled life. Part of the narrative was as good as the 'Heart of Darkness'. What a story, kept me captivated and engaged throughout the 440 odd pages. For me the most interesting aspect was the self reflection of the White colonisation of Africa. I tend to agree with Hartley's dad. They should have never gone into Africa. Whence gone in they should never have left it. Arabs colonised Africa before the Europeans, and they stayed on, slowly converting the local cultures to Islam. Now it is impossible to differentiate between the two races in Africa. This book is a homage to the few but extremely courageous Europeans who decided to stay on, long after their mother-ship had decided to go back. Aidan's experiences in some of the most vile and despicable massacres in Africa clearly demonstrates the important role of white man still has in controlling human disasters on unimaginable scale in Africa. Perhaps the most important insight I have had from the book is the working of the Western media when covering human catastrophes, where there is an implicit policy of fitting the pigeon holes of the Charities, reader’s fatigue, and stock market reactions. It does seem like that traditional media has become pretty ineffective and needs to be completely redefined.
Read the book if you want to witness the real face of human nature.
Read the book if you want to witness the real face of human nature.
January 29, 2012
The author delivers a book that will stay with me long after the last page is turned. One quarter travelogue, another family history and the other half memoirs the author shows us Africa in all it's brutality and sadness. Not what I was expecting but an essential read to remind us what we should not forget.
January 28, 2011
In the first 20 or so pages I was grumbling as I found myself drowning in adjectives. Though, as Hartley hits his stride, the prose loses the overwritten feel and develops into a very fine book.
I'm not sure he needed the device of 'the Zanzibar chest' as a framing tool. It's almost insecurity. Almost like he didn't think the true stories of an intrepid reporter in the middle of the worst of the worst atrocities in Mogadishu and Rwanda would hold the reader's interest so he needed to spice it up with this fable-like construction that almost acted as a speed bump for me. I'm not exactly sure how I would've structured it differently; as I wouldn't want to lose the story of his father and Davey, but the way it wove in and out of Aidan's story was often awkward. Basically, I think he needed a better editor. The Somalia and Rwanda sections, in particular, were amazing and didn't need some cutesy narrative device.
I don't think I agree that Aidan seems disconnected from Africans; I think that's a hard argument to make after reading the book. Colonialism, on the other hand, is an interesting character throughout. While the, "we should never have come here" thread is strong; at time he waivers in Somalia, as he thinks colonialism is exactly what is necessary to end the killing. There is sincere hope that the Americans will bring with them, ultimately, ballot boxes and hospitals. After reading a book like King Leopold's Ghost, one sort of winces at any statement that's even vaguely pro-colonial, but he's certainly right. In Rwanda or Mogadishu, there is certainly a compelling moral argument for international intervention of some kind.
I'm not sure he needed the device of 'the Zanzibar chest' as a framing tool. It's almost insecurity. Almost like he didn't think the true stories of an intrepid reporter in the middle of the worst of the worst atrocities in Mogadishu and Rwanda would hold the reader's interest so he needed to spice it up with this fable-like construction that almost acted as a speed bump for me. I'm not exactly sure how I would've structured it differently; as I wouldn't want to lose the story of his father and Davey, but the way it wove in and out of Aidan's story was often awkward. Basically, I think he needed a better editor. The Somalia and Rwanda sections, in particular, were amazing and didn't need some cutesy narrative device.
I don't think I agree that Aidan seems disconnected from Africans; I think that's a hard argument to make after reading the book. Colonialism, on the other hand, is an interesting character throughout. While the, "we should never have come here" thread is strong; at time he waivers in Somalia, as he thinks colonialism is exactly what is necessary to end the killing. There is sincere hope that the Americans will bring with them, ultimately, ballot boxes and hospitals. After reading a book like King Leopold's Ghost, one sort of winces at any statement that's even vaguely pro-colonial, but he's certainly right. In Rwanda or Mogadishu, there is certainly a compelling moral argument for international intervention of some kind.
July 28, 2009
While the first 100 pages or so were hard to get through due to the boasting tone Hartley took as he listed off all of his adventurous British ancestors, this changed as he began writing about his own experiences as a reporter in Africa. His account of this time was amplified due to him being witness to (or involved in) every major conflict to grip Africa in the late 80s and 90s. Ethiopa, Rwanda, Somalia - they are all here and in a vivid detail I had not encountered before.
What makes Hartley's writing so compelling is the brutal honesty. He spares no-one, not even himself. He lays bare his own weaknesses, dalliances, and regrets. He also pulls no punches when it comes to those around him. Most novel for me was to hear him lay the blame for the conflicts he saw squarely at the feet of the participants. While he did call out the UN and some multinational forces for mismanagement, inefficiency, and unrealistic goals - he focused his blame for the root cause of the problems the UN was trying to fix on the Africans. Some of his descriptions of life in Somalia, and the mindset of a Somali tribal fighter, were truly mind-boggling. His account of the Rwandan genocide was harrowing, and will stay with me.
Given such powerful stories, the "other" narrative he weaves throughout the book - his attempt to piece together the life of his father's friend - pales in comparison. I'm sure it was an important journey for him personally, but it is difficult to connect with.
Overall a great read - after page 100 I couldn't put it down.
What makes Hartley's writing so compelling is the brutal honesty. He spares no-one, not even himself. He lays bare his own weaknesses, dalliances, and regrets. He also pulls no punches when it comes to those around him. Most novel for me was to hear him lay the blame for the conflicts he saw squarely at the feet of the participants. While he did call out the UN and some multinational forces for mismanagement, inefficiency, and unrealistic goals - he focused his blame for the root cause of the problems the UN was trying to fix on the Africans. Some of his descriptions of life in Somalia, and the mindset of a Somali tribal fighter, were truly mind-boggling. His account of the Rwandan genocide was harrowing, and will stay with me.
Given such powerful stories, the "other" narrative he weaves throughout the book - his attempt to piece together the life of his father's friend - pales in comparison. I'm sure it was an important journey for him personally, but it is difficult to connect with.
Overall a great read - after page 100 I couldn't put it down.
November 11, 2016
Whatever everyone else sees in this book to grant it such a high rating is beyond me. A great story, but it's lacking in good writing, reflection and depth, not to mention an ability to connect (though that part could just be me).
September 24, 2018
Truly 5 stars. Such a beautiful, interesting, absorbing book, hard to believe that it didn't win every possible medal/prize for Non-Fiction. I know why it didn't--because it unflinchingly tells the truth about the UN and USA, the UK and their actions in Africa.
I suspect many of the leaders of those entities would NOT want any of us to read this book. So--please READ THIS BOOK--if you have any interest in Africa WHATSOEVER.
The author was a foreign correspondent in the early 1990's in Ethiopia, Somalia, Rwanda, Kenya, Tanzania, Sudan, the Balkans, and probably other countries that I can't recall. Hartley turned 30 in 1995. He was born in Kenya and raised in England and returned to Africa after Oxford, which makes his life fascinating just with those facts alone.
The book recounts his travels and experiences during the Ethiopian famine, the Hutu-Tutsi genocide in Rwanda and the conflict in Somalia. Hartley and his friend actually coined the term "Warlords" to describe the militia tribal leaders.
I loved that he writes clearly, factually, without anger, regarding the events that led to his severe PTSD.
In between Hartley's experiences, there is a separate story regarding his father's friend, Peter Davey and Davey's murder in 1947. Hartley wanted to tell this story because he inherited Davey's diaries, which his father stored for 50 years in "The Zanzibar Chest." However, I did not feel Davey's story was nearly as compelling as Hartley's, and it didn't really belong in this volume.
Hartley, despite being a professional newspaperman, had to work hard to put this book together. Parts of it aren't as smooth as he would have liked, no doubt.
Parts of this were slow-going for me, until I caught on. Caught on to what, you ask?
At around page 101, I started to highlight interesting sentences. Then, at about page 139, I started writing a letter "C" in the margin next to sentences/paragraphs which contained Contrast. I realized Hartley thinks in terms of Contrasts and expresses himself as such. Some of the Contrasts were true Irony, others were simply contrasts. For example: contrasts between poor/rich, what is/what should be, truth/fantasy, story/propaganda, fact/distortion, violent/sweet, love/hate, angry/welcoming, tall/short, beautiful/ugly, beautifully alive/horribly dead, beliefs/the actuality, war/peace, gorilla versus human behavior, shame/accomplishment, passion/calm.
Once I realized this, the book (especially the chapters recounting his own first-hand experiences) became AWESOME.
Some great quotes in this book:
"At least I get to do what they taught me in the foreign service and have drinks with a room full of mass murderers."
"Encouraging the militias to form a government was like appointing the Mafia to run Manhattan."
"But the challenge was to make audiences appreciate that naked, black, Muslim Africans were worth caring for."
"Mogadishu was so dangerous and out-of-this-world that Reid Miller, the veteran AP correspondent used to say, 'I wouldn't even send my first wife there.'"
And there are hundreds of other moving/funny/incredible/horrifying sentences in this book-the above are entirely random.
READ IT.
I suspect many of the leaders of those entities would NOT want any of us to read this book. So--please READ THIS BOOK--if you have any interest in Africa WHATSOEVER.
The author was a foreign correspondent in the early 1990's in Ethiopia, Somalia, Rwanda, Kenya, Tanzania, Sudan, the Balkans, and probably other countries that I can't recall. Hartley turned 30 in 1995. He was born in Kenya and raised in England and returned to Africa after Oxford, which makes his life fascinating just with those facts alone.
The book recounts his travels and experiences during the Ethiopian famine, the Hutu-Tutsi genocide in Rwanda and the conflict in Somalia. Hartley and his friend actually coined the term "Warlords" to describe the militia tribal leaders.
I loved that he writes clearly, factually, without anger, regarding the events that led to his severe PTSD.
In between Hartley's experiences, there is a separate story regarding his father's friend, Peter Davey and Davey's murder in 1947. Hartley wanted to tell this story because he inherited Davey's diaries, which his father stored for 50 years in "The Zanzibar Chest." However, I did not feel Davey's story was nearly as compelling as Hartley's, and it didn't really belong in this volume.
Hartley, despite being a professional newspaperman, had to work hard to put this book together. Parts of it aren't as smooth as he would have liked, no doubt.
Parts of this were slow-going for me, until I caught on. Caught on to what, you ask?
At around page 101, I started to highlight interesting sentences. Then, at about page 139, I started writing a letter "C" in the margin next to sentences/paragraphs which contained Contrast. I realized Hartley thinks in terms of Contrasts and expresses himself as such. Some of the Contrasts were true Irony, others were simply contrasts. For example: contrasts between poor/rich, what is/what should be, truth/fantasy, story/propaganda, fact/distortion, violent/sweet, love/hate, angry/welcoming, tall/short, beautiful/ugly, beautifully alive/horribly dead, beliefs/the actuality, war/peace, gorilla versus human behavior, shame/accomplishment, passion/calm.
Once I realized this, the book (especially the chapters recounting his own first-hand experiences) became AWESOME.
Some great quotes in this book:
"At least I get to do what they taught me in the foreign service and have drinks with a room full of mass murderers."
"Encouraging the militias to form a government was like appointing the Mafia to run Manhattan."
"But the challenge was to make audiences appreciate that naked, black, Muslim Africans were worth caring for."
"Mogadishu was so dangerous and out-of-this-world that Reid Miller, the veteran AP correspondent used to say, 'I wouldn't even send my first wife there.'"
And there are hundreds of other moving/funny/incredible/horrifying sentences in this book-the above are entirely random.
READ IT.
October 6, 2019
I wonder what it meant that I enjoyed being a journalist but spent my time witnessing so much killing and suffering. I told myself that observing extremes gave me a heightened sense of morality, but it might have meant the opposite, that to go on like that proved one was some sort of borderline psychopath (Zanzibar Chest, p.391).
Hartley is a product of his upbringing in Africa and England, an Oxford graduate with a Master's from SOAS. He joined Reuters as a foreign correspondent covering primarily Africa, where his heart is and where he lives, in his homeland Kenya. This book is an account of both his father's and his own footsteps across these regions, with interspersed, snippets of the history of Peter Davey as drawn from his own diaries. Davey was a British diplomat, friend of his father's, who went native in Yemen and died there whilst in service.
Although to many Hartley's account seems confusing, I found his writing drew me in like a man thirsty for water in an oasis after a journey in the desert. Admittedly, his exploits and accounts of his life as a foreign correspondent are the product of a young man in search of risk and adventure induced adrenaline mingled with evenings bathed in alcohol, drugs, sex and laddish behaviours. The dichotomy between his own life and what he witnesses can cause one to feel that he never could be a real African, that this attempt at going native himself was destined from the start to be an oxymoron. But it is his love for these lands, his absolute passion for this continent that save him and that make this work and his accounts of love and war riveting for anyone that loves this continent viscerally. It is in the last section, where he covers the Rwanda genocide in 1994, perhaps entering a new phase in his life, that he really comes of age. Here, after losing many of his colleagues and friends in Somalia and the brutality of Mogadishu, he witnesses human bestiality beyond words. I didn't realise he had accompanied Kagame's RPF Tutsis as they entered Kigali after the 100 days genocide. To this day, he admits he does not have sufficient words to describe what he saw, and his story here becomes photographic, like the accounts of anyone who has experienced trauma to the core.
Aidan's work is of a brilliance of writing that few can claim. His book almost comes across as a psychoanalytic journey, with lucidity and dreamlike states mixed in with an attempt at finding a common thread from the past to the present to understand his own manhood, and what this means in the context of his genealogy.
I recommend this work to anyone who is interested in Africa, preferably an individual who has good knowledge of the continental wars and history. For this type of reader, Hartley's work provides a grassroots account of what happened to individuals mixed in this sociopolitical quagmire in the eighties and nineties, his visuals and stories providing fundamental anecdotal evidence bridging the gap between the institutionally-fed single truth and multifaceted fragmented reality on the ground.
Hartley is a product of his upbringing in Africa and England, an Oxford graduate with a Master's from SOAS. He joined Reuters as a foreign correspondent covering primarily Africa, where his heart is and where he lives, in his homeland Kenya. This book is an account of both his father's and his own footsteps across these regions, with interspersed, snippets of the history of Peter Davey as drawn from his own diaries. Davey was a British diplomat, friend of his father's, who went native in Yemen and died there whilst in service.
Although to many Hartley's account seems confusing, I found his writing drew me in like a man thirsty for water in an oasis after a journey in the desert. Admittedly, his exploits and accounts of his life as a foreign correspondent are the product of a young man in search of risk and adventure induced adrenaline mingled with evenings bathed in alcohol, drugs, sex and laddish behaviours. The dichotomy between his own life and what he witnesses can cause one to feel that he never could be a real African, that this attempt at going native himself was destined from the start to be an oxymoron. But it is his love for these lands, his absolute passion for this continent that save him and that make this work and his accounts of love and war riveting for anyone that loves this continent viscerally. It is in the last section, where he covers the Rwanda genocide in 1994, perhaps entering a new phase in his life, that he really comes of age. Here, after losing many of his colleagues and friends in Somalia and the brutality of Mogadishu, he witnesses human bestiality beyond words. I didn't realise he had accompanied Kagame's RPF Tutsis as they entered Kigali after the 100 days genocide. To this day, he admits he does not have sufficient words to describe what he saw, and his story here becomes photographic, like the accounts of anyone who has experienced trauma to the core.
Aidan's work is of a brilliance of writing that few can claim. His book almost comes across as a psychoanalytic journey, with lucidity and dreamlike states mixed in with an attempt at finding a common thread from the past to the present to understand his own manhood, and what this means in the context of his genealogy.
I recommend this work to anyone who is interested in Africa, preferably an individual who has good knowledge of the continental wars and history. For this type of reader, Hartley's work provides a grassroots account of what happened to individuals mixed in this sociopolitical quagmire in the eighties and nineties, his visuals and stories providing fundamental anecdotal evidence bridging the gap between the institutionally-fed single truth and multifaceted fragmented reality on the ground.
September 12, 2012
Hartley has written something of a memoir of himself and his family. Truth be told, his family history is quite interesting, filled with individuals occupying important roles in Britain's colonial history. Hartley himself, who was born and grew up in East Africa, became a journalist and the book is like personal therapy to come to terms with the the death of his father and the violence he was faced with while working in (mostly) African warzones.
The book is interesting, but not nearly as good as the quotes and reviews printed on the cover of the book would have you believe. Then again, since the book is clearly a journalist's memoir, that probably is the exact reason why editors and journalists loved the book. They see themselves, or a version of themselves they never were.
Hartley's section on Rwanda is shocking in its descriptions, but also describes nothing not said in other works.
The book is interesting, but not nearly as good as the quotes and reviews printed on the cover of the book would have you believe. Then again, since the book is clearly a journalist's memoir, that probably is the exact reason why editors and journalists loved the book. They see themselves, or a version of themselves they never were.
Hartley's section on Rwanda is shocking in its descriptions, but also describes nothing not said in other works.
October 12, 2009
Very good. Different and disturbing, but an excellent book.
June 13, 2021
4.5 stars. Review to follow.
September 5, 2017
This book is on balance worth reading, despite its many flaws. It often seems like one giant effort from a self-obsessed son of an idealized father, wherein the son keeps trying to paint himself as an intrepid son of African adventure, who despite his being paid to report the misery and pointlessness of struggles like Somalia and Rwanda, somehow retains his little boy innocence: ex: "I had missed Operation Desert Storm, the biggest war story so far of our generation. I no longer cared. I had decided that what I was looking for was a war that I could call my own, a story that was mine, a complete experience that would define me as the son of my fathers and involve me as an insider..." [puke]. Consciously (I hope) but without credits citing to various rock and roll lines, eg (referring to a man named Celestine)"I wondered what a man with a name derived from the word 'heavenly' was doing in the mud, blood and beer of my world"--parroting Johnny Cash's famous lines in "Boy Named Sue" (although without attribution), etc
So why read the book? Manly bc it does a very good job of showing how even cynical hacks (rejecting photos of starving children because they were "Not. Thin. Enough", making up heart warming stories which were palpably not true and winning prizes for writing what the people in the distant rich world wanted to believe, he nonetheless also shows the development community, UN, and western politicians to be believably cynical, counterproductive and ignorant--perhaps spectacularly so in Somalia. Where the UN officer in charge agrees the actress they bring in to call attention to the famine was a has been, but that "they had thought about bringing in Madonna but she was too sexy for a famine...". where photographers trample and break a leg of a starving child in their rush to take photos of the actress but the reporters are asked by the UN people not to report it, because of its effect on reducing public contributions. How western democracy caused the polarization of Hutus from Tutsis and led to one of the world's worst massacres--although Hartley does at least indicate that the Holocaust, the Armenians in 1915, Stalin and Mao were right up there as well. But despite these crystal clear examples of political incompetence and hypocrisy, Hartley shows he is part of the problem, complaining about the readers who did not find "desperate enough" the stories he tried to pen to make the situation seem desperate .
His recounting of Somalia is worth putting up with his self-obsession (I think he wrote the book while still in his 30s). He captures the inanity of US and UN political leadership, quoting Madeline Albright fatuously saying "In Somalia, we are blazing a new trail for the United Nations..." and predating the Emerald City referring to aide and UN people staying behind intense security lines in "MogaDisney", never getting out and staying only for 9 months to get danger pay and launching inevitably less then precision precision strikes. Where in the midst of civilian slaughter and war lord kidnapping and hideous murders, the UN's employees safe in their walled off city wrote "reams of memos to New York, Edicts returned by satellite on how local councils were to be gender-balanced, suggesting topics for discussion at seminars on human rights and timetables for multiparty polls. Even amidst the fighting, the UN lavished money on projects to 'empower' civil society, women's groups and schools. Anything to pretend this was a society with hope".
But then he recounts with apparent jocularity how Hartley and his fellow hacks' cheated spectacularly on their expense accounts, covering litres of whiskey, drunken "orgies" with local women, and most dramatic insult or caper among the community of hacks. At the end he cites his dying father--a colonial agronomist--as concluding "We (the British colonialists) should never have come here".
But just when you feel tempted to toss the book in one of the few remaining trash cans in the airport nearest you, Hartley comes out with a memorable vignette: "I tried to ignore the anonymous masses for so long, but in the end they have all come back to haunt me: the refugees, the injured, the starving and the dead. And each and every one has a name."
So why read the book? Manly bc it does a very good job of showing how even cynical hacks (rejecting photos of starving children because they were "Not. Thin. Enough", making up heart warming stories which were palpably not true and winning prizes for writing what the people in the distant rich world wanted to believe, he nonetheless also shows the development community, UN, and western politicians to be believably cynical, counterproductive and ignorant--perhaps spectacularly so in Somalia. Where the UN officer in charge agrees the actress they bring in to call attention to the famine was a has been, but that "they had thought about bringing in Madonna but she was too sexy for a famine...". where photographers trample and break a leg of a starving child in their rush to take photos of the actress but the reporters are asked by the UN people not to report it, because of its effect on reducing public contributions. How western democracy caused the polarization of Hutus from Tutsis and led to one of the world's worst massacres--although Hartley does at least indicate that the Holocaust, the Armenians in 1915, Stalin and Mao were right up there as well. But despite these crystal clear examples of political incompetence and hypocrisy, Hartley shows he is part of the problem, complaining about the readers who did not find "desperate enough" the stories he tried to pen to make the situation seem desperate .
His recounting of Somalia is worth putting up with his self-obsession (I think he wrote the book while still in his 30s). He captures the inanity of US and UN political leadership, quoting Madeline Albright fatuously saying "In Somalia, we are blazing a new trail for the United Nations..." and predating the Emerald City referring to aide and UN people staying behind intense security lines in "MogaDisney", never getting out and staying only for 9 months to get danger pay and launching inevitably less then precision precision strikes. Where in the midst of civilian slaughter and war lord kidnapping and hideous murders, the UN's employees safe in their walled off city wrote "reams of memos to New York, Edicts returned by satellite on how local councils were to be gender-balanced, suggesting topics for discussion at seminars on human rights and timetables for multiparty polls. Even amidst the fighting, the UN lavished money on projects to 'empower' civil society, women's groups and schools. Anything to pretend this was a society with hope".
But then he recounts with apparent jocularity how Hartley and his fellow hacks' cheated spectacularly on their expense accounts, covering litres of whiskey, drunken "orgies" with local women, and most dramatic insult or caper among the community of hacks. At the end he cites his dying father--a colonial agronomist--as concluding "We (the British colonialists) should never have come here".
But just when you feel tempted to toss the book in one of the few remaining trash cans in the airport nearest you, Hartley comes out with a memorable vignette: "I tried to ignore the anonymous masses for so long, but in the end they have all come back to haunt me: the refugees, the injured, the starving and the dead. And each and every one has a name."
March 19, 2017
This was a fantastic book, though I must admit parts of it are very tough to get through- more on that later. It is also really multiple stories combined into one book.
1. The title refers to a chest his father had with diaries and journals detailing his fathers work during the last 30 some years of British colonial rule in Africa and Yemen.
2. The book details the author's quest to travel to Yemen and learn as much as possible and see the location that make up his fathers friend's journal, and to learn how and why he died.
3. The author was a front line reporter who covered what happened in Somalia starting in 1990.
4. The author was front line reporting from the beginning on the genocide that took place in Rwanda.
It is # 3 and 4 that make this book a tough read, and the author himself says what he reported and has written for the book do even begin to convey the horrors he witnessed.
The majority of Africa went from being ruled by Europe and the people being treated like shit, to being ruled by dictators who the people either elected or who took over via a coup, and treated the people like shit. And when those leaders were toppled a new madman dictator took their place, to loot the country and treat the people like shit. This is why there are certainly no easy answers to fixing Africa, if in fact there is a fix.
What I liked about the author's perspective is that it wasn't sermonizing, it wasn't pointing the finger at just one group and saying Them, they are 5he reason the country is a mess. Everyone associated with the countries of Africa are to blame.
By the end of the book it is clear the author is suffering severe PTSD, but as this came out 12 years ago that tag wasn't used to label his condition.
If you want an introduction to the atrocities committed in Somalia and Rwanda, if you want an introduction to the good as well as the bad that the British contributed to Africa and Yemen, if you want a history lesson and an adventure, or if you want to be exposed to the pure evil the human race is capable of, read The Zanzibar Chest.
1. The title refers to a chest his father had with diaries and journals detailing his fathers work during the last 30 some years of British colonial rule in Africa and Yemen.
2. The book details the author's quest to travel to Yemen and learn as much as possible and see the location that make up his fathers friend's journal, and to learn how and why he died.
3. The author was a front line reporter who covered what happened in Somalia starting in 1990.
4. The author was front line reporting from the beginning on the genocide that took place in Rwanda.
It is # 3 and 4 that make this book a tough read, and the author himself says what he reported and has written for the book do even begin to convey the horrors he witnessed.
The majority of Africa went from being ruled by Europe and the people being treated like shit, to being ruled by dictators who the people either elected or who took over via a coup, and treated the people like shit. And when those leaders were toppled a new madman dictator took their place, to loot the country and treat the people like shit. This is why there are certainly no easy answers to fixing Africa, if in fact there is a fix.
What I liked about the author's perspective is that it wasn't sermonizing, it wasn't pointing the finger at just one group and saying Them, they are 5he reason the country is a mess. Everyone associated with the countries of Africa are to blame.
By the end of the book it is clear the author is suffering severe PTSD, but as this came out 12 years ago that tag wasn't used to label his condition.
If you want an introduction to the atrocities committed in Somalia and Rwanda, if you want an introduction to the good as well as the bad that the British contributed to Africa and Yemen, if you want a history lesson and an adventure, or if you want to be exposed to the pure evil the human race is capable of, read The Zanzibar Chest.
April 12, 2012
While this book wasn’t what I was expecting, I want to declare right at the outset that it was REALLY REALLY GOOD! The author, Aidan Hartley, is a journalist and The Zanzibar Chest is his memoir of his childhood, being born and raised in Tanzania, and also the years of his 20′s and 30′s, when he was war correspondent in Africa. The son of a British military colonial, Aidan’s family had a rich history of living the ex-pat life. Weaving in tales of his father’s life in Africa, Aidan Hartley narrates a scene of beauty, love, fear and loss.
At night, lions grunted and roared and the hollow volcanic hill rumbled as rhino cantered by … “We were in a paradise,” said my father, “that we can never forget, nor equal.”
As the book progresses, the reader is a fly on the wall, observing the life of a young journalist.
“I remember how an American dropped his trousers for a group of us at the bar and boasted how he’d lost his left testicle in a Balkans mine blast, which he claimed hadn’t prevented him from seducing a nurse during his recovery in a Budapest hospital.”
As Hartley finds himself in the midst of war-torn Somalia, Serbia and Rwanda, his writing becomes darker and eventually he cannot distance himself from the horror.
“They say we journalists ignored the story for months. We were there all the time. What’s true is that we didn’t understand at the time the full magnitude of what was happening. I was an ant walking over the rough hide of an elephant. I had no idea of the scale of what I was witnessing.”
I highly, highly recommend this superb memoir. 4 1/2 stars.
At night, lions grunted and roared and the hollow volcanic hill rumbled as rhino cantered by … “We were in a paradise,” said my father, “that we can never forget, nor equal.”
As the book progresses, the reader is a fly on the wall, observing the life of a young journalist.
“I remember how an American dropped his trousers for a group of us at the bar and boasted how he’d lost his left testicle in a Balkans mine blast, which he claimed hadn’t prevented him from seducing a nurse during his recovery in a Budapest hospital.”
As Hartley finds himself in the midst of war-torn Somalia, Serbia and Rwanda, his writing becomes darker and eventually he cannot distance himself from the horror.
“They say we journalists ignored the story for months. We were there all the time. What’s true is that we didn’t understand at the time the full magnitude of what was happening. I was an ant walking over the rough hide of an elephant. I had no idea of the scale of what I was witnessing.”
I highly, highly recommend this superb memoir. 4 1/2 stars.
September 7, 2017
Oh this book. I in turn loved it and hated it. How can you not be drawn in by the intensity of so many human tragedies? That being said, how can you not be completely turned off by the author and his tone? Whether he intended to come across this way or not, he portrayed himself as being involved in, but somehow above his colonial roots. He is a Brit born in Africa, so he saw himself as somehow more legitimate than other ex-pats, all the while behaving exactly like the ex-pats he believed he was better than.
So, if you're interested in having a window into the geopolitical workings of Africa in the 1940's as well as 1980's-1990's this is an interesting and riveting tale. Just be prepared to stomach the narcissistic narrative of a spoiled brat who, for how much he traveled, has a rather selfish, narrow view of the world.
So, if you're interested in having a window into the geopolitical workings of Africa in the 1940's as well as 1980's-1990's this is an interesting and riveting tale. Just be prepared to stomach the narcissistic narrative of a spoiled brat who, for how much he traveled, has a rather selfish, narrow view of the world.
February 19, 2017
Not too much about Zanzibar but a great read about Africa.
On one level the book is about the author. How he is/was as a journalist a violence junkie. and the writing is a purging of his demons.
Prompted by discovering the chest - see title - and the writings of a friend of his father. and too about his father and family and his relation to them. He a brit born in Africa with family roots in Empire. this percolates throughout the story.
Mogadishu, Serbia, Ethiopia, Rwanda and so forth keep the story going. Have a strong stomach and hopefully little proclivity for nightmares if you choose to read this book.
A top of the line well written read.
On one level the book is about the author. How he is/was as a journalist a violence junkie. and the writing is a purging of his demons.
Prompted by discovering the chest - see title - and the writings of a friend of his father. and too about his father and family and his relation to them. He a brit born in Africa with family roots in Empire. this percolates throughout the story.
Mogadishu, Serbia, Ethiopia, Rwanda and so forth keep the story going. Have a strong stomach and hopefully little proclivity for nightmares if you choose to read this book.
A top of the line well written read.
February 18, 2020
In theory I should have loved this book, but I really struggled to connect with it.
The chapters discussing Hartley's first-hand accounts as a foreign correspondent in Somalia (1991) and Rwanda (1994) were the highlight for me.
The chapters discussing Hartley's first-hand accounts as a foreign correspondent in Somalia (1991) and Rwanda (1994) were the highlight for me.
June 19, 2021
Powerful, bitter, fascinating, disturbing, sad, funny and more packed into this account. When I think of excellent accounts of harrowing journalistic encounters, I think of Philip Caputo's 'Means of Escape' which I read and reviewed on Amazon (before they booted my for not paying enough into Jeff Bezos pocket) some time back. 'The Zanzibar Chest' is certainly in that league. The book covers Aidan Hartley's reporting (and much more) for Reuters from Ethiopia, Somalia, Bosnia, and Rwanda in late 1980s to mid 1990s, locations and times that few above a certain age need reminding of. It is not comfortable reading in any way but riveting and horrifying at times in the dark way in which we are all fascinated by darkness for whatever reason. The added layer that makes this a truly unique memoir is his family story. Born in Africa, son of a British colonial official in the fading days of the Empire. The story of his father's experience and that of his friend Peter Davey (from a diary he found in the Zanzibar Chest) in the colonial service is fascinating and almost alone worth the read. The descriptions of life in Kenya and Yemen back in those far-off days are wonderful. Had tough time with a final rating, as I might have preferred a 4.5, but giving the benefit of the doubt.
June 5, 2022
The author came off as racist, sexist, ignorant, and mentions sleeping with teenagers like it’s no issue. No remorse for anything and no sympathy for the victims he wrote about, besides the white Serbs he encountered (and he mentions he feels bad because they are white). I don’t understand why this book was sensationalized
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
April 21, 2018
This book was excruciatingly difficult to read and I thought I might never finish it but am glad that I did. When I purchased it I had no idea what I was actually getting into. War, genocide, and brutality are detailed with graphic description, but so are introspection, honesty, and insight. I am thankful that I did not turn away from learning of the horrors this world holds for many, and the beauty, love, and affection that can be discovered in the midst.
November 7, 2021
A classic!
August 3, 2013
It's very hard for me to write about this book (which it why I'll give it a shot), as it's all a little too close to home, and any attempt to review this book will be more about just reviewing myself (and who wants to read that)?
This is a book both shallow and deep, meaningless and profound. The mixture of nostalgia and irritation that I feel with the writer, his reminiscences, and his lifestyle are of course directly linked to my feelings about my own career and life choices. I'm surprised - and both relieved and disturbed - that the stories of Africa and the Middle East still catch my imagination, and my memory, making me miss people and places I've seen, and look forward to more in the future. At the same time, the meaninglessness and downright foolishness that I see in both the author's life and (at least parts of) my own, are very uncomfortable. I feel like I've met so many people like the author during my travels, and to some degree, I feel have become him. But perhaps what's most troublesome is how conflicted I still feel towards the whole thing, and what I've done and continue to do. Aid workers, journalists, soldiers and spies - most of these would disagree with me, but I rarely see much difference between them. Some people, (and who am I to fault them?), are convinced they are doing things that need to be done, and that other people are better off for it. While others don't feel they doing odd things in far off places for any other reason than that they cannot choose to do otherwise. Still not sure which I am. All I know is that the places, and the people, still inspire me and trouble me.
All that said, in the end it's just a book and it's the writing that matters. And I've got to say he's got some great passages.
On the disintegration of Somalia: "As correspondent, I suppose my job was to excite the sympathy of the world for this forgotten and reviled people, but all I can say now is that I have felt it a privilege to observe a people who shot themselves in the foot with such accuracy and tumbled into the abyss in such style." (p.201)
On hospitals treating genocide perpetrators in Rwanda: "When you whacked a bump of ketamine into a guy he began to hallucinate right there on the slab. He swatted imaginary flies, flipped out on his own out-of-body experience, believing he'd arrived in heaven and the doe-eyed virgins were feeding him grapes for eternity. No wonder he was pissed off with the doctors when he woke up to find he was still a Hutu ax murderer except that his legs had been chopped off at the knees and all his mates were scurrying for the border." (p.408)
On going back to "normal" life: "I never suffered like that female inmate, but for years I did endure some sort of payback. I have to try every day to prevent the poison that sits in my mind to spread outward and hurt the people I love. Sometimes I can't stop it and I wonder if in some way the corruption will be passed on from me to my children." (p.428)
This is a book both shallow and deep, meaningless and profound. The mixture of nostalgia and irritation that I feel with the writer, his reminiscences, and his lifestyle are of course directly linked to my feelings about my own career and life choices. I'm surprised - and both relieved and disturbed - that the stories of Africa and the Middle East still catch my imagination, and my memory, making me miss people and places I've seen, and look forward to more in the future. At the same time, the meaninglessness and downright foolishness that I see in both the author's life and (at least parts of) my own, are very uncomfortable. I feel like I've met so many people like the author during my travels, and to some degree, I feel have become him. But perhaps what's most troublesome is how conflicted I still feel towards the whole thing, and what I've done and continue to do. Aid workers, journalists, soldiers and spies - most of these would disagree with me, but I rarely see much difference between them. Some people, (and who am I to fault them?), are convinced they are doing things that need to be done, and that other people are better off for it. While others don't feel they doing odd things in far off places for any other reason than that they cannot choose to do otherwise. Still not sure which I am. All I know is that the places, and the people, still inspire me and trouble me.
All that said, in the end it's just a book and it's the writing that matters. And I've got to say he's got some great passages.
On the disintegration of Somalia: "As correspondent, I suppose my job was to excite the sympathy of the world for this forgotten and reviled people, but all I can say now is that I have felt it a privilege to observe a people who shot themselves in the foot with such accuracy and tumbled into the abyss in such style." (p.201)
On hospitals treating genocide perpetrators in Rwanda: "When you whacked a bump of ketamine into a guy he began to hallucinate right there on the slab. He swatted imaginary flies, flipped out on his own out-of-body experience, believing he'd arrived in heaven and the doe-eyed virgins were feeding him grapes for eternity. No wonder he was pissed off with the doctors when he woke up to find he was still a Hutu ax murderer except that his legs had been chopped off at the knees and all his mates were scurrying for the border." (p.408)
On going back to "normal" life: "I never suffered like that female inmate, but for years I did endure some sort of payback. I have to try every day to prevent the poison that sits in my mind to spread outward and hurt the people I love. Sometimes I can't stop it and I wonder if in some way the corruption will be passed on from me to my children." (p.428)
July 27, 2010
I picked this up at NBO airport on my way to Zanzibar, having heard a few good things about it. The first disappointment was that it was not about Zanzibar, which could have been avoided if I'd found out a little more about the book before sitting down with it on the beach. I didn't love it.
This is really two books in one, which is what I've averaged together for three stars (I think I'd like to give it 2.5 but won't). I didn't think the two halves really meshed well together. The most important, for which the book is known, is the author's shared experiences from his time as a Reuters correspondent covering east and central Africa largely in the 1990s (I'll come back to this). The other of the two is an entirely pretentious, self-absorbed recounting of the author's/his circle's privileged life, likely written out of some need to prove himself to his parents or the like. The first 75 pages outlining his colonial pedigree kind of made me want to vomit. From there he goes into what I found to be a rather disjointed recounting of the life of one Peter Davey, a former (colonial) mate of his father's whose journals from his life in Arabia had fallen into the author's hands.
The author's stories of his time covering African news makers, mainly Somalia and Rwanda, was very interesting, not just for the historical insight into these now nearly forgotten news stories but also for trying to understand the psyche of the type of person who is attracted to these environments (something I think about a lot working in peacekeeping). I enjoyed these segments of the book. The other part of the book, retracing the steps and recounting the exploits of his father's friend in the Arabian peninsula sixty years later, didn't really appeal to me either in subject or in the way that it alternated chapter for chapter with the author's own stories. The Arabian stories were interesting, but perhaps just not my cup of tea and not what I was expecting to find in this book. I didn't really see the common thread.
In closing, I would recommend that anyone looking for an account of a foreign correspondent's African experiences read Kapuscinski's "The Shadow of the Sun" instead (though it is more historical in its perspective).
This is really two books in one, which is what I've averaged together for three stars (I think I'd like to give it 2.5 but won't). I didn't think the two halves really meshed well together. The most important, for which the book is known, is the author's shared experiences from his time as a Reuters correspondent covering east and central Africa largely in the 1990s (I'll come back to this). The other of the two is an entirely pretentious, self-absorbed recounting of the author's/his circle's privileged life, likely written out of some need to prove himself to his parents or the like. The first 75 pages outlining his colonial pedigree kind of made me want to vomit. From there he goes into what I found to be a rather disjointed recounting of the life of one Peter Davey, a former (colonial) mate of his father's whose journals from his life in Arabia had fallen into the author's hands.
The author's stories of his time covering African news makers, mainly Somalia and Rwanda, was very interesting, not just for the historical insight into these now nearly forgotten news stories but also for trying to understand the psyche of the type of person who is attracted to these environments (something I think about a lot working in peacekeeping). I enjoyed these segments of the book. The other part of the book, retracing the steps and recounting the exploits of his father's friend in the Arabian peninsula sixty years later, didn't really appeal to me either in subject or in the way that it alternated chapter for chapter with the author's own stories. The Arabian stories were interesting, but perhaps just not my cup of tea and not what I was expecting to find in this book. I didn't really see the common thread.
In closing, I would recommend that anyone looking for an account of a foreign correspondent's African experiences read Kapuscinski's "The Shadow of the Sun" instead (though it is more historical in its perspective).
January 31, 2010
Aidan Hartley simultaneously tells his personal story of growing up and working in Africa while detailing the lives of his father and his father's good friend. After reading the journals of the two men -- kept for many years in his father's Zanzibar chest -- he embarks on a search for answers about their lives. Along the way, he examines the draw of Africa to so many British, the two men and his own fascination and love for the continent.
The most powerful parts of this story are Hartley's own, as he details with brutal clarity wars in Somalia and Rwanda, among others. This book will give any reader a new appreciation for the lives some journalists lead and a new respect for their courage, daring and honesty.
The most powerful parts of this story are Hartley's own, as he details with brutal clarity wars in Somalia and Rwanda, among others. This book will give any reader a new appreciation for the lives some journalists lead and a new respect for their courage, daring and honesty.
June 8, 2009
This is not well-written, the plot was thin and I almost stopped reading it. But I always finish a book I start. (It's an annoying quirk of mine.) I'm glad I did, because I got a view of the Rwandan genocide I did not have before. And I used to live in that area. It was as if someone I knew was there and writing to me about what he saw. The thing is, it takes a long time to get there. Hartely wanders around Africa for quite a while before he lands in Rwanda. Some of the parts about Somalia were worth reading, too.
October 4, 2011
So many recommendations for this book. Very disappointing and hard to read. I guess I expected too much. Having lived in East Africa for nearly 30 years I could empathize with a lot of author's observations. But the wars, the battles, the ugly life he led, so passionate and debauched. I kept waiting for insights, depth, understanding, revelations, something uplifting, but got a steady stream of disjointed scenes, encounters, thoughts and back glances to his father, family and Peter Davey. Maybe he should have waited a bit longer to digest all his experiences before writing this chronicle.
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