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A Voyager Out: The Life of Mary Kingsley
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$ 20.71
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$ 24.95 |
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| Item Number |
333707 |
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Item Description...
Product Description
Mary Kingsley began her life as a typically conventional Victorian woman. She would end up travelling to some of the most inhospitable regions of Africa and became one of the most celebrated travellers of the day. At the age of 31, she sailed on a cargo ship along the coast from Sierra Leone to Angola and then traveled inland from Guinea to Nigeria, studying African customs and beliefs. On her second journey, she ventured into remote parts of Gabon and the French Congo--the first European to do so. She encountered cannibals and crocodiles, studied the religious customs of the reclusive Fang tribe, climbed Mount Cameroon and explored the Ogowe River, trading cloth for ivory and rubber to fund her trip. She returned only once to Africa, during the Boer War, when she worked as a nurse and journalist. Tragically, she died of typhoid in 1900, only 38 years old.
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Item Specifications...
Pages 352
Dimensions: Length: 7.64" Width: 5.12" Height: 1.26"
Weight: 0.84 lbs.
Binding Softcover
Release Date Jan 8, 2006
ISBN 184511020X
EAN 9781845110208
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Availability 2 units.
Availability accurate as of May 26, 2012 06:36.
Usually ships within one to two business days from La Vergne, TN.
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Reviews - What do our customers think?
 | Exciting Biography of a Little-Known Intrepid Englishwoman Apr 30, 2007 |
| On the surface, Victorian Englishwoman Mary Kingsley was an unlikely choice for intrepid explorer. The spinster daughter of a wealthy British nobleman who dedicated almost fifteen years of her life to nursing first her invalid mother and then her father, Mary's life was trapped by duty and honoring her parental bond. But when her parents died within months of each other, 29-year old Mary was faced with the task of shaping her own destiny. Her flamboyant, careless father George Kingsley had imbued Mary with a passion for travel and adventure through his occasional letters home to Mary and her sickly mother who suffered from the common complaints of upperclass Victorian women: inexplicable headaches, neuralgia and fainting spells that would always worsen if Mary attempted to escape the family homestead. Inspired by her father, Mary set out to explore West Africa. Dressed in a white cotton blouse and a long black woolen skirt, Mary ran the treacherous rapids of the Ogooue River; fell into a twenty-foot elephant trap studded with spikes, walked unarmed into Fang villages and unflinchingly confronted hostile native chiefs. Through it all, Mary retained a quintessential British attitude of cheerful competence in the face of danger. When a loose bag with a suspicious smell yielded human body parts in the camp of a tribe of cannibals, Mary matter-of-factly took an inventory of everything before returning everything to their containers. She spent almost a year forging through jungles, observing natives before returning to England to write about her adventures. Kingsley's two books, "Travels in West Africa" and "West African Studies" became best sellers. She became a sensation on the lecture circuit, bringing her exciting stories and her dry wit to many venues. But back in England, Mary was plagued by illness, headaches, colds and neuralgia like her mother. Her younger brother expected Mary to become his housekeeper and nurse as she had done for her mother and father. But Mary had fallen in love --- with a country that claimed her soul and filled her waking hours with yearning to return. Frank has written an excellent biography that draws the most exciting, telling parts of Kingsley's books but also fills in what Mary preferred to leave out: the wild, alluring heart of a continent. | | |  | Pursuit Of Knowledge Under Difficult Circumstances Feb 14, 2006 |
Rudyard Kipling said of MH Kingsley, "Being human, she must have feared some things, but one never arrived at what they were." Three species of fish and several books are only part of Kingsley's singular legacy.
Very interesting biography of this intrepid Victorian explorer, whose extraordinary exploits one suspects might have been aided by the blessedly poor socialization afforded her as an untrained, unschooled, half-Cockney and half-forgotten "poor little rich girl", who later escaped a confining existence.
The prose is deft but echoes Kingsley a little gratingly at times, rather than quoting. | | | | The life of a woman who should be a legend Dec 21, 1997 |
| I picked up this book at a thrift shop - my usual venue for book purchases - solely due to the title. I knew nothing of Mary Kingsley prior to reading this absorbing account of her life. Her childhood and early adult life would give no clue to the extraordinary adventures she would have in Africa, culminating in her death while serving as a nurse with the British Army in South Africa. Rudyard Kipling said of her that she was "the bravest person I know" - I hope I have the quote correct. I cannot check as I gave my copy of the book to a friend who bears a striking resemblance to Miss Kingsley. | | | Write your own review about A Voyager Out: The Life of Mary Kingsley
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