Absolutely crushing. Aidan Hartley details his career as a war correspondent covering stories from the Ethiopian civil war and Somalia to the brutal genocide in Rwanda. The accounts are often sickening and sometimes even funny, but as I continued reading, I realized that the story is just as much about Hartley himself - and how one copes with a life that's constantly in contact with the worst parts of humanity.

The narrative device - alternating between Hartley's own eye-witness accounts of reporting on genocide and civil war with his recap of his quest to unearth the history of his father's time as a British foreign service agent in Yemen - thankfully gives the reader a chance to catch one's breath.

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

Very good. Different and disturbing, but an excellent book.

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 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.

words on paper

good luck

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.

Spotty. Didn’t hold my interest. Gave up in a yet another bar in Nairobi.

Another entry into the canon of white war correspondent literature; though the non linear narrative made me feel like I was the one losing my mind, not the narrator. The side quest involving the chest of the title was bewildering and never fully explained. Could have benefitted from an editor's pen and been half as long to focus on the Rwanda and Somalia coverage, which was gripping, rather than the odd traipse around Yemen.

If you just took a moment to think about the devastation wrought on Africa since the white man landed on its vast coastlines, you would weep. Britain, Italy, Germany, France, Portugal, Russia, America, Spain, Turkey: they have all left their indelible and catastrophic mark on the continent. Once these countries have wrought their havoc, bled the place dry of its resources, its people and its essence they leave. And really in our little Western worlds we think very little and very infrequently of that vast and diverse land mass. Our interest is really only piqued when we are full on exposed to the ravages of famine and drought, the madness and tyranny of its leaders, or the blood and gore and horror of its wars. And who brings us this news, who ensures we have full frontals of these events, who piques our consciences? The foreign press, foreign correspondents, journalists. Virtually all the journalists we have anything to do with in our daily lives are those attached to our daily newspapers and nightly TV news entertainment - reporting on the mindless trivia of local and national politics, chasing 'celebs' for nothing meaningful, commentating on the latest sporting event, reporting on the day's court cases - you get the picture. But out there, a long way from our comfortable and tiny existences are the real journalists - those that report on stuff that does matter.

Aidan Hartley is one of those real journalists. He is in the incredibly unique position of actually being a child of Africa himself. Descended from a long line of adventurers, explorers, soldiers and men of action who variously contributed to the ever expanding British empire, he also has that urge to discover, explore, do something different with his life and see the world. From seeing news footage from Vietnam on TV one evening in his teens, he knew that being a journalist was what he wanted to do. And he wanted to do it in Africa.

Due to his childhood in various parts of Africa and being his father's son, Aidan developed a very deep love for the land, its people and all the tragedies that have happened to it as a result of foreign intervention. As a young man he finally made it back to Africa and began his reporting career in 1988 as a stringer for the Financial Times in Tanzania. From that time on till the mid-1990s Aidan was on the spot to report, for our Western eyes and ears, on virtually every bit of conflict and catastrophe to hit Africa. And he pulls absolutely no punches about what he sees and how most of the mess that Africa is currently in is due to interference from the West and the total powerlessness and uselessness of the UN in 'mananging' the various conflicts. He sees too much death, brutality, hunger, poverty and waste. Including the deaths of many of his fellow correspondents and friends. He saves his worst for his reporting of the Rwanda massacres in 1997. Be prepared, it is not pretty reading.

There is absolute no doubt that his experiences have scarred him deeply. On his father's death, Aidan discovers a wealth of other stories in his father's Zanzibar chest and he intersperses his modern day observations with the tragic story of his father's close friend who also loved Africa intensely.

This is a remarkable book for the author's passion in telling his story, the catharsis such writing must have been for him, his ability to convey the horrors he saw, the sheer futility and waste of money, life, and energy that was going on around him, and the infinite variety of good and bad humanity he was exposed to. He does come out the other side, but it is a long and difficult road to that point. He has come full circle however; living happily with his wife and young children in Kenya. This is a very big book and will stay with you for a long time after you finish reading it.

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.

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.