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Travel
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320 pages, Paperback 216x138mm, Portrait
Published October 2012 |
ISBN-10: 190676896X ISBN-13: 9781906768966
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The Last Banana (paperback)
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Shelby Tucker first went to East Africa in 1967 to visit his university friend Marios Ghikas who then farmed on the slopes of Kilimanjaro, Tanzania. Marios' grandfather had been one of the first of many Greeks to settle there. Anticipating nationalization, Marios invited Tucker to visit again to help him spend 'the last banana' of his 'unremittable fortune', and Tucker made 16 trips over the next 43 years. Nyerere's policy of 'returning' land to the watu (people) destroyed the Greek community. Three stayed on: Marios was one. In this absorbing and elegantly written book, Tucker recalls conditions in equatorial Africa before the European 'scramble' for colonies. Tucker contrasts the moral force and fruits of the pioneer missionaries and explorers who brought Christianity to Africa with the triviality of modern travel and the surrealism of 'democracy' and 'freedom' expounded in Africa today.
'It is a fascinating, even heroic tale'
Robert Carver in The Independent
This remarkable and brilliant book...Shelby Tucker is that rare species of travel writer: an authentic adventurer of expansive Victorian self-confidence...
Michael Moran in The Tablet
Click this link for a television interview with the author. |
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| Shelby Tucker - Shelby Tucker read law at Oxford, and is an unparalleled adventurer. He is also the author of Among Insurgents: Walking Through Burma, Colin Thubron's Book of the Year. His novel 'Client Service' is also published (July 2012) by Stacey.
Related title(s): The Last Banana By Shelby Tucker Client Service By Shelby Tucker
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