293 pages
English language
Published May 10, 1983 by North Point Press.
A pioneer aviator's life in Africa.
From a letter to Maxwell Perkins: "Did you read Beryl Markham's book, West with the Night? I knew her fairly well in Africa and never would have suspected that she could and would put pen to paper except to write her flyer's log book. As it is, she has written so well, and marvelously well, that I was completely ashamed of myself as a writer. I felt that I was simply a carpenter with words, picking up whatever was furnished on the job and nailing them together and sometimes making an okay pig pen. But [she] can write rings around all of us who consider ourselves as writers. The only parts of it that I know about personally, on account of having been there at the time and heard the other people's stories, are absolutely true. ... I wish you would get …
A pioneer aviator's life in Africa.
From a letter to Maxwell Perkins: "Did you read Beryl Markham's book, West with the Night? I knew her fairly well in Africa and never would have suspected that she could and would put pen to paper except to write her flyer's log book. As it is, she has written so well, and marvelously well, that I was completely ashamed of myself as a writer. I felt that I was simply a carpenter with words, picking up whatever was furnished on the job and nailing them together and sometimes making an okay pig pen. But [she] can write rings around all of us who consider ourselves as writers. The only parts of it that I know about personally, on account of having been there at the time and heard the other people's stories, are absolutely true. ... I wish you would get it and read it because it is really a bloody wonderful book." (Ernest Hemingway)
An adventurous life - on the Kenyan plains, training racehorses, flying thousands of civilian often solo hours - but best for how reverently she gives voice to other's lives and deaths around her.
Interessant, aber auch beunruhigend in seiner vollständigen Problem- und Privilegienblindheit (britische Landnahme in Kenia, Reiche-Leute-Beschäftigungen in der Kolonie, schwarze Diener, Elefantensafari, Elfenbein). Wird sich so mit hundert Jahren Abstand mein gesamtes Leben lesen? Fünfzig? Jetzt schon? (Also abzüglich so Dinge wie erste Atlantiküberquerung mit dem Flugzeug natürlich, die hier vorbildlich beiläufig und unspektakulär beschrieben wird.)
Poetry. Start to finish.
