A Zoo in my Luggage
Oct. 1st, 2014 12:33 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
elfbiterGerald Durrell - A Zoo in My Luggage
Gerald Durrell wanted to gather animals for his own zoo (even if he had no idea where it could be build). He had previously captured animals for others and now had money to start his own. So he went back to Cameroons to the area of an old friend Fon of Bafut - local tribal king with dozen wives and taste for whiskey - and had the locals to bring him local animals.
The book is mostly composed of anecdotes and commentary of couple of animals Durrell captured - he mostly paid locals to capture the rest for him - and how some of the more industrious simians (and bucketful of frogs) caused him trouble. Also, even if the back cover blurb makes it as if trying to find the final place for the zoo was something dramatic - well, it wasn't. Just fly to Jersey.
Apparently this book is also made the 10th Fon of Bafut somewhat famous. He is mostly a jovial drunk with lots of wives and councilors. Africans in general are described in paternalistic manner as jovial, simple and somewhat childlike. Probably they were just polite to a white guy buying lots of critters from them.
Gerald Durrell wanted to gather animals for his own zoo (even if he had no idea where it could be build). He had previously captured animals for others and now had money to start his own. So he went back to Cameroons to the area of an old friend Fon of Bafut - local tribal king with dozen wives and taste for whiskey - and had the locals to bring him local animals.
The book is mostly composed of anecdotes and commentary of couple of animals Durrell captured - he mostly paid locals to capture the rest for him - and how some of the more industrious simians (and bucketful of frogs) caused him trouble. Also, even if the back cover blurb makes it as if trying to find the final place for the zoo was something dramatic - well, it wasn't. Just fly to Jersey.
Apparently this book is also made the 10th Fon of Bafut somewhat famous. He is mostly a jovial drunk with lots of wives and councilors. Africans in general are described in paternalistic manner as jovial, simple and somewhat childlike. Probably they were just polite to a white guy buying lots of critters from them.
