He reports dispassionately about a woman cowering in a doorway as she is beaten with a heavy stick by a turbaned older man, and, later, about a naked man chased down by a howling mob that caught and killed him. Therouxs metaphors and images are captivating: wooden plows shaped like wishbones, the mud stink rose like part of the darkness, and fingerless lepers screeching for alms like a procession of tax collectors. Naipaul, saying everything Naipaul wrote about Africa was informed by the fear that he had known as an isolated Hindu child in black Trinidad, so that Naipaul wrote as an outsider who feels weak.

He faults the writing of his old friend, Nobel prize winner V.S. He spends time with Nadine Gordimer, whose writing he praises, and talks about other national writers he admires, including Naguib Mahfouz, writing about Egypt, Shusaku Endo in Japan and R. These include Africans who spent years as political prisoners, old friends from his days in the Peace Corps, a couple of young prostitutes, taxi drivers, and white settlers whose lives have been defined by decades of turbulence and insecurity. Hes at his best when he gets people along the way to tell him their stories he captures the tone of their personalities and the substance of their experiences. Theroux proudly describes his own sense of adventure: They said the road was the most dangerous in Africa, and so, of course, I wanted to go there. And his narrative includes extensive reporting from political and historical records, contextualizing his personal observations. He rounds out his account with descriptions written by earlier travelers, Flaubert and Rimbaud in particular. From the chaos and filth of urban slums to small isolated villages, Theroux listens to peoples stories, argues with bureaucrats, rides hideously derelict buses and trains, and records his impressions. In Dark Star Safari, he sets out to travel the length of Africa, from Cairo to Cape Town, staying as far as possible off the tourist trail.

P AUL THEROUX HAS DEVELOPED a reputation as a travel writer who informs and entertains while being acutely perceptive and at the same time coldly judgmental. Reviewed by Sharon Dirlam (Russian Far East 1996≩8)

The dark star safari