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The African Trilogy #2
African Silences
African Silences is a powerful and sobering account of the cataclysmic depredation of the African landscape and its wildlife. In this critically acclaimed work Peter Matthiessen explores new terrain on a continent he has written about in two previous books, A Tree Where Man Was Born -- nominated for the National Book Award -- and Sand Rivers.Through his eyes we see elephants, white rhinos, gorillas, and other endangered creatures of the wild. We share the drama of the journeys themselves, including a hazardous crossing of the continent in a light plane. And along the way, we learn of the human lives oppressed by bankrupt political regimes and economies, and threatened by the slow ecological catastrophe to which they have only begun to awaken.
240 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 1991
30 people are currently reading
356 people want to read
About the author
Peter Matthiessen
145 books918 followersPeter Matthiessen is the author of more than thirty books and the only writer to win the National Book Award for both non-fiction (The Snow Leopard, in two categories, in 1979 and 1980) and fiction (Shadow Country, in 2008). A co-founder of The Paris Review and a world-renowned naturalist, explorer and activist, he died in April 2014.
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Displaying 1 - 24 of 24 reviews
November 29, 2021
Forth Matthiessen book I have read now, and even if obscure, I found it to be one of the better ones. This is one of those instances when brevity had its merits, unlike the other African book The Tree Where Man Was Born, which I had found to be overly lengthy, this was kept at a good pace and succinct, yet still packing entertainment and excitement. While most of it was purely travel narrative of what happened, how and when, there were also good sections on the unique and interesting ecology of the African rain forest and its inhabitants, the star of which was the forest elephant - the subject of the majority of this book and reason for his overflight of central Africa in the late 1980s. Coincidentally an estimate of elephant numbers through dung survey but with modern DNA analysis was just completed as I write this. Gabon remains the stronghold with almost 100,000 - a higher figure than 30 years ago happily.
Two shorter preceding chapters described his travels in west Africa, and a short trip to Zaire (Congo) where intimate encounters with gorillas were excellently written about. In contrast to the raw wilderness of Gabon and the Congo, west Africa at the time of Matthiessen's visit (1978 Ivory Coast) was already largely bereft of wildlife having suffered the ravages of a seething human population for centuries. Quite depressing to read about all told, and perhaps the silence the author alluded to in the book title.
Two shorter preceding chapters described his travels in west Africa, and a short trip to Zaire (Congo) where intimate encounters with gorillas were excellently written about. In contrast to the raw wilderness of Gabon and the Congo, west Africa at the time of Matthiessen's visit (1978 Ivory Coast) was already largely bereft of wildlife having suffered the ravages of a seething human population for centuries. Quite depressing to read about all told, and perhaps the silence the author alluded to in the book title.
June 25, 2020
Peter Matthiessen considered this to be a companion to his East African book, THE TREE WHERE MAN WAS BORN, but this book was published 20 years later and covers travels that the author did in 1978 and 1986 on animal life in western and central Africa. The first essay were wildlife surveys in Senegal and Cote D'Ivoire and one where he saw very little wildlife; the second took place in the eastern Zaire (now the DRC) and he was not that successful in seeing much on that trip either. The "silences" of the title refers to this lack of animal life in these places. Finally, a much longer essay is about a flying trip to Zaire, Central African Republic and Gabon, to survey the extent of bush elephants that lived in those countries. It is an interesting trip. They were more successful at seeing wildlife on this trip. It was an interesting set of trips and worth reading, even if they took place more than 30 years ago.
September 18, 2015
_African Silences_ by Peter Matthiessen is a well-written account of three different trips to the continent by the author.
The first essay detailed a trip he made in 1978 to West Africa, accompanying primatologist Gilbert Boese on a wildlife survey of Senegal, Gambia, and Ivory Coast. When the journey began Matthiessen was hopeful, as it was a region he had not previously visited and included such varied terrains as long-grass savanna, forest, and the Sahel, an arid country that stretches all the way east to Sudan, a land of "parched thornbrush of baobab and scrub acacia, red termite hills, starlings and hornbills."
Matthiessen did see some wildlife. In Niokolo Koba, the last stronghold of large animals in Senegal, he spied baboons, several monkey species, several antelope species (such as duiker and waterbucks), hippos, forest buffalo, warthogs and parakeets. Along the Senegalese coast, in a mangrove swamp, he spotted the unusual palm-nut vulture, a striking white bird that lives mainly on the nut of the oil palm.
Largely though the author saw remarkably little wildlife. He noted that some researchers felt that some mammals - such as the black rhino, wildebeest, and zebra - if they ever occurred in West Africa, vanished long ago. Others believed that the poor soil of the region could not support much in the way of large game animals, though Matthiessen pointed out its similarities with the soil of the famous East African game plains. No, West Africa lacks wildlife simply because it is more populous than East Africa and has been inhabited a great deal longer, with people present raising crops of pearl millet and sorghum, burning woodland, and hunting for at least the last 2000 years, competing for the same land favored by the megafauna. In addition, there isn't much impetus to preserve wildlife for the tourist trade as there is in East Africa and also the populous nations of this region are filled with poor, protein-starved desperate people, viewing wildlife as a much needed part of their diet. Indeed in several languages in West Africa the word for "animal" is the same word for "meat." As a result, most of the region has virtually "unobstructed poaching" and in some nations, such as Nigeria, it is unusual to see any live wild animal outside of its one game reserve (the black rhino, giant eland, and all but 9 of its 32 hoofed mammal species have gone extinct in Nigeria).
His second essay takes place in the same year but in Zaire, where the author journeyed to look for the very rarely seen Congo peacock (according to one source at the time only one non-African had ever seen one live in the wild) and the gorilla. After a delay in the broken-down, littered, depressing city of Kinshasa, the author journeyed deep into the forested interior (Zaire is huge, comparable in size to Europe). While Matthiessen got some good observations of gorillas and delighted in some of the animals unique to the highlands, such as the red-faced woodland warbler, regal sunbird, and the L'Hoesti monkey, the peafowl eluded him.
The longest and most enjoyable essay in the book was that describing his 1986 sojourn through Central Africa to determine the status of the small forest elephant of the Congo Basin. Since the savanna or bush elephant (_Loxodonta africana africana_) had at the time been imperiled by rampant ivory poaching, conservationists feared that poachers would turn to the smaller forest race (_L. a. cyclotis_). Ivory trade proponents argued that large numbers of the forest race were hidden in the dense jungle and could continue to support the ivory trade while ecologists feared that in fact the forested interior was inhospitable habitat and forest elephant numbers had always been low. In addition to the importance this would have on getting international support to curtail or stop the ivory trade, researchers wanted to know if there really was a third race, perhaps even a separate species, of elephant, the pygmy elephant (_L. pumilio_). Did it exist at all? Were they merely smaller members of the more common forest race?
Matthiessen and those he traveled with found many surprises, such as the presence of "bush" elephants deep in the forest. Were they refugees from the ivory trade, wandering individuals who had simply journeyed deep into the jungle, or did they always exist there, perhaps genetic evidence that the now nearly continuous forest was once broken up into a number of refugia, separated by savanna and grassland? They also found many individuals showed characteristics of both bush and forest races, indicating a very wide zone of hybridization and speculated that the "pygmy elephant" was merely a juvenile forest elephant, which as a race had offspring independent at an earlier age.
The entire expedition made for great reading. It was a long one, covering 7000 miles, beginning in Kenya and ending in Libreville, on Gabon's Atlantic coast, largely concentrating on the Central African Republic, Gabon, and Zaire. Made in a light plane, it was a perilous journey, the pilot and the author at the mercy of the titanic thunderstorms of the region, continually having to risk arrest by landing in unauthorized areas to refuel, dealing with corrupt officials, and almost never able to put down thanks to the "awesome inhospitality of the equatorial forest," as any light plane landing in the jungle would "disappear into this greenness like a stone dropped from the air into the sea." The immense forest, "undulating in all directions to the green horizon," a "dark green sea," was, while dangerous to fly over, nevertheless magnificent, containing all the greens in the world - "[f]orest green and gray-green, jade, emerald, and turquoise, pond green, pea green," a land of hard to find but nevertheless remarkable wildlife, including gorillas, chimpanzees, okapi, bongos, buffalo, and such primates as the vervet or green monkey, a carrier for the dangerous "green monkey disease," said to be related to the AIDS virus. Matthiessen also spent some time with a group of pygmies, the Mbuti.
The first essay detailed a trip he made in 1978 to West Africa, accompanying primatologist Gilbert Boese on a wildlife survey of Senegal, Gambia, and Ivory Coast. When the journey began Matthiessen was hopeful, as it was a region he had not previously visited and included such varied terrains as long-grass savanna, forest, and the Sahel, an arid country that stretches all the way east to Sudan, a land of "parched thornbrush of baobab and scrub acacia, red termite hills, starlings and hornbills."
Matthiessen did see some wildlife. In Niokolo Koba, the last stronghold of large animals in Senegal, he spied baboons, several monkey species, several antelope species (such as duiker and waterbucks), hippos, forest buffalo, warthogs and parakeets. Along the Senegalese coast, in a mangrove swamp, he spotted the unusual palm-nut vulture, a striking white bird that lives mainly on the nut of the oil palm.
Largely though the author saw remarkably little wildlife. He noted that some researchers felt that some mammals - such as the black rhino, wildebeest, and zebra - if they ever occurred in West Africa, vanished long ago. Others believed that the poor soil of the region could not support much in the way of large game animals, though Matthiessen pointed out its similarities with the soil of the famous East African game plains. No, West Africa lacks wildlife simply because it is more populous than East Africa and has been inhabited a great deal longer, with people present raising crops of pearl millet and sorghum, burning woodland, and hunting for at least the last 2000 years, competing for the same land favored by the megafauna. In addition, there isn't much impetus to preserve wildlife for the tourist trade as there is in East Africa and also the populous nations of this region are filled with poor, protein-starved desperate people, viewing wildlife as a much needed part of their diet. Indeed in several languages in West Africa the word for "animal" is the same word for "meat." As a result, most of the region has virtually "unobstructed poaching" and in some nations, such as Nigeria, it is unusual to see any live wild animal outside of its one game reserve (the black rhino, giant eland, and all but 9 of its 32 hoofed mammal species have gone extinct in Nigeria).
His second essay takes place in the same year but in Zaire, where the author journeyed to look for the very rarely seen Congo peacock (according to one source at the time only one non-African had ever seen one live in the wild) and the gorilla. After a delay in the broken-down, littered, depressing city of Kinshasa, the author journeyed deep into the forested interior (Zaire is huge, comparable in size to Europe). While Matthiessen got some good observations of gorillas and delighted in some of the animals unique to the highlands, such as the red-faced woodland warbler, regal sunbird, and the L'Hoesti monkey, the peafowl eluded him.
The longest and most enjoyable essay in the book was that describing his 1986 sojourn through Central Africa to determine the status of the small forest elephant of the Congo Basin. Since the savanna or bush elephant (_Loxodonta africana africana_) had at the time been imperiled by rampant ivory poaching, conservationists feared that poachers would turn to the smaller forest race (_L. a. cyclotis_). Ivory trade proponents argued that large numbers of the forest race were hidden in the dense jungle and could continue to support the ivory trade while ecologists feared that in fact the forested interior was inhospitable habitat and forest elephant numbers had always been low. In addition to the importance this would have on getting international support to curtail or stop the ivory trade, researchers wanted to know if there really was a third race, perhaps even a separate species, of elephant, the pygmy elephant (_L. pumilio_). Did it exist at all? Were they merely smaller members of the more common forest race?
Matthiessen and those he traveled with found many surprises, such as the presence of "bush" elephants deep in the forest. Were they refugees from the ivory trade, wandering individuals who had simply journeyed deep into the jungle, or did they always exist there, perhaps genetic evidence that the now nearly continuous forest was once broken up into a number of refugia, separated by savanna and grassland? They also found many individuals showed characteristics of both bush and forest races, indicating a very wide zone of hybridization and speculated that the "pygmy elephant" was merely a juvenile forest elephant, which as a race had offspring independent at an earlier age.
The entire expedition made for great reading. It was a long one, covering 7000 miles, beginning in Kenya and ending in Libreville, on Gabon's Atlantic coast, largely concentrating on the Central African Republic, Gabon, and Zaire. Made in a light plane, it was a perilous journey, the pilot and the author at the mercy of the titanic thunderstorms of the region, continually having to risk arrest by landing in unauthorized areas to refuel, dealing with corrupt officials, and almost never able to put down thanks to the "awesome inhospitality of the equatorial forest," as any light plane landing in the jungle would "disappear into this greenness like a stone dropped from the air into the sea." The immense forest, "undulating in all directions to the green horizon," a "dark green sea," was, while dangerous to fly over, nevertheless magnificent, containing all the greens in the world - "[f]orest green and gray-green, jade, emerald, and turquoise, pond green, pea green," a land of hard to find but nevertheless remarkable wildlife, including gorillas, chimpanzees, okapi, bongos, buffalo, and such primates as the vervet or green monkey, a carrier for the dangerous "green monkey disease," said to be related to the AIDS virus. Matthiessen also spent some time with a group of pygmies, the Mbuti.
November 11, 2021
Africa in the 60s already had a surprisingly depleted volume of wildlife. Matthiessen chronicles this in his numerous adventures there, the travel and logistics of which are in themselves fascinating topics. But oh, how he writes... the detail, the flow, the commentary I find neither overly judgmental nor solely observational, nor sitting-on-the-fence. It's a tough line to toe, but he does it magnificently and his writing is lyrical, honest and succinct. Despite the complexity that permeates his writing through his deft knowledge of flora, fauna and ecosystems - as well as historical and political dynamics of a region - his words engage, intrigue and glide across the page. Few writer's minds are equipped to tackle the challenge of painting the picture of a continent that is in perennial ecological and political turmoil, but Mathiesssen poetically and masterfully captures and conveys the dichotomies between the chaos and beauty, subjugated and sublime.
June 15, 2023
Being the record of an American author taking three trips into Equatorial Africa -- Eastern and Central -- to observe wildlife, as a sort of embedded writer in others' trips.
Peter Matthiessen, co-founder with (among other people) George Plimpton, of _The Paris Review_, and the only person to win the National Book Award for both non-fiction (_The Snow Leopard_) and fiction (_Shadow Country_), was an ex-CIA agent and a notable writer for progressive causes, from ecological concerns (beginning with _Wildlife in America_ in 1959) through civil rights (_Sal Si Puedes_, a seminal 1969 book on Cesar Chavez; _In the Spirit of Crazy Horse_, a book on the Leonard Peltier case which got him and the publisher sued [spoiler: they won]).
The first trip, in 1978, went through parts of Senegal, Gambia, and Côte d'Ivoire, and is covered in the shortest of the book's three chapters, titled "African Silences," largely for the rather frightening shortage of large mammals observed.
The second trip, a little later in 1978, was an _Audobon_ magazine expedition to the then-Zaire, to look for _Afropavo congensis_, the "Congo Peacock" (which, despite the startlingly-similar plumage, is not a peacock at all, but a kind of pheasant). Though they did see many interesting birds, _Afropavo_ was not among them. They also saw a number of gorillas; the second aprt is thus called "Of Peacocks and Gorillas."
On the third trip, he accompanied David Western, who piloted them from Nairobi, through Central African Republic, across Cameroon, to Gabon, the Congo Republic, Zaire, Tanzania, and finally back to Kenya, in an attempt to assess the state of _Loxodonta africana_, the African elephant. Though they were looking for elephants in general, they also hoped to clear up the status of the so-called "pygmy elephant," said to be found (if with some difficulty) in the forests of Eastern Equatorial Africa. (Spoiler: they determined that the "pygmy" elephant was not a separate species, but the pure form of _L. africana cyclotis_, the African forest elephant.) Along the way they were arrested once on suspicion of espionage, and aided repeatedly by Bantu who live along the roads, and pygmy (particulary Mbuti) residents of the great forests. (Indeed, they spent some time with Kange, to whom Colin Turnbull dedicated his anthropological study of the Mbuti, _The Forest People_, and his ... is tribe the right word? At any rate, his large family group.) This part, "Pygmies and Pygmy Elephants," is the main part of the book, rather longer than the other two together.
Though not exactly depressing, _African Silences_ is a clear warning of what was happening in Africa then, and is continuing to happen now. Wildlife was being devastated not only by poaching (especially for gorilla hands, for elephant tusks, and for rhino horns) and by habitat destruction (both by "civilized" pursuits and by the slash-and-burn agriculture long practiced by some Bantu groups), but also by the indifference of corrupt (and often tyrannical) governments.
Well, some things never change, do they... in Africa, or anywhere else...
Peter Matthiessen, co-founder with (among other people) George Plimpton, of _The Paris Review_, and the only person to win the National Book Award for both non-fiction (_The Snow Leopard_) and fiction (_Shadow Country_), was an ex-CIA agent and a notable writer for progressive causes, from ecological concerns (beginning with _Wildlife in America_ in 1959) through civil rights (_Sal Si Puedes_, a seminal 1969 book on Cesar Chavez; _In the Spirit of Crazy Horse_, a book on the Leonard Peltier case which got him and the publisher sued [spoiler: they won]).
The first trip, in 1978, went through parts of Senegal, Gambia, and Côte d'Ivoire, and is covered in the shortest of the book's three chapters, titled "African Silences," largely for the rather frightening shortage of large mammals observed.
The second trip, a little later in 1978, was an _Audobon_ magazine expedition to the then-Zaire, to look for _Afropavo congensis_, the "Congo Peacock" (which, despite the startlingly-similar plumage, is not a peacock at all, but a kind of pheasant). Though they did see many interesting birds, _Afropavo_ was not among them. They also saw a number of gorillas; the second aprt is thus called "Of Peacocks and Gorillas."
On the third trip, he accompanied David Western, who piloted them from Nairobi, through Central African Republic, across Cameroon, to Gabon, the Congo Republic, Zaire, Tanzania, and finally back to Kenya, in an attempt to assess the state of _Loxodonta africana_, the African elephant. Though they were looking for elephants in general, they also hoped to clear up the status of the so-called "pygmy elephant," said to be found (if with some difficulty) in the forests of Eastern Equatorial Africa. (Spoiler: they determined that the "pygmy" elephant was not a separate species, but the pure form of _L. africana cyclotis_, the African forest elephant.) Along the way they were arrested once on suspicion of espionage, and aided repeatedly by Bantu who live along the roads, and pygmy (particulary Mbuti) residents of the great forests. (Indeed, they spent some time with Kange, to whom Colin Turnbull dedicated his anthropological study of the Mbuti, _The Forest People_, and his ... is tribe the right word? At any rate, his large family group.) This part, "Pygmies and Pygmy Elephants," is the main part of the book, rather longer than the other two together.
Though not exactly depressing, _African Silences_ is a clear warning of what was happening in Africa then, and is continuing to happen now. Wildlife was being devastated not only by poaching (especially for gorilla hands, for elephant tusks, and for rhino horns) and by habitat destruction (both by "civilized" pursuits and by the slash-and-burn agriculture long practiced by some Bantu groups), but also by the indifference of corrupt (and often tyrannical) governments.
Well, some things never change, do they... in Africa, or anywhere else...
March 22, 2021
Matthiessen's travels in central and western Africa in 1978 and 1986, searching for increasingly disappearing wildlife - the "silences" he experienced, both the quiet and the absence of wildlife. Although his second journey, seeking forest elephants, was more successful, his journeys overall were not as overwhelmingly positive as those described in The Tree Where Man was Born - Africa was changing, and the wild areas were increasingly threatened. His writing is, of course, nonetheless poetic and reflective as ever.
July 9, 2023
I read this starting on the way home from Uganda.
But even though there were parts that captured many things African, this was too dated to be enjoyable.
Too many references to people and places that were incomprehensible and/or inexplicable to me. (And really, no way to look them all up at 35,000 feet)
But even though there were parts that captured many things African, this was too dated to be enjoyable.
Too many references to people and places that were incomprehensible and/or inexplicable to me. (And really, no way to look them all up at 35,000 feet)
December 31, 2023
A painful read due to my own academia-related aversion to reading nonfiction for pleasure. I enjoyed most everything Mathiessen had to say and found the conversations around the various relationships between white people in Africa and Africans very interesting.
April 14, 2020
Dated travelogue with a somber message, but somewhat marred by its attitude towards the various Africans who come on the scene.
September 27, 2022
An amazing book. I had not read any Matthiessen since Snow Leopard, so when I found this discounted at the book store, I pounced on it. It is a must read for those of us who dream of Africa.
January 29, 2024
Good study CAR and Congo elephants
October 7, 2010
A field diary written by a (poetic) naturalist for naturalists & other extremely patient people who will tire through detailed descriptions of various fowl (peafowl, water fowl, rock fowl), stone partridges, francolins, laughing doves, pranticoles, etc for Matthiessen's tiny shocks of lovely, dreamy description. He's pedantic, meditative and transcendental all the while, which is why it's taken me forever to make any headway. I picked this up right before my parents headed off for the jungles and lakes of Tanzania and, months later, I'm still only occasionally picking it up to read a handful of pages. His writing style perfectly suits the subject: unbroken jungles, impenetrable forests, fetish houses, marginal environments and sub-groups, phantasmagoria, liana-strewn cloud forests and spindly bridges. He wrote this in 1978, but his observation at the time was that East Africa's wildlife was suffering primarily from intensive settlement, while West Africa was suffering because of outright destruction of the animals themselves. Does anyone have recommendations for more timely, non-fiction books on Africa?
July 6, 2017
Du kan skille mellom gode og viktige bøker. Denne er muligens enda viktigere enn den er god, men den er god så det holder. Å følge miljøskribenten Peter Mathiessen på tre helt forskjellige reiser på det afrikanske kontinentet er en magisk leseopplevelse, han tar deg til steder du egentlig ikke visste du kunne reise, og han behandler det med en varhet og en respekt som du knapt finner i moderne sakprosa. Mathiessen elsket Afrika, han elsket den afrikanske faunaen, og han skrev om det på en sakte og tankefull måte som både ga meg helt ny innsikt i trusselen mot artsmangfoldet på det afrikanske kontinentet og som forsterket mitt allerede intense ønske om å kjenne dette kontinentet under huden.
July 4, 2015
Accounts of three trips to Africa in the company of scientists studying wildlife in 1978-1986. Much of the wildlife has already been decimated (especially evident in the first trip to West Africa (Senegal, Gambia, & Ivory Coast). Matthiessen's keen powers of observation and sparkling prose are here as expected (but not the introspection of "The Snow Leopard"). A generally well-written and depressing book about wildlife conservation. I'd give it 4 stars if it weren't for Matthiessen's annoying commentary of the physiques of African women and often condescending tone. Still, there are some good adventures here and I'm glad I read it.
February 2, 2013
A 3.5 would be a closer score. I have always enjoyed Matthiessen's style, and I enjoyed it here as well, although this isn't "The Snow Leopard" either. I'm sure many things have changed since this was first published... hopefully some for the better. Matthiessen is someone you would love to travel with, and he describes those travels with a passion that carries you along... whether it be to a shower with an attacking mongoose, or in a small airplane facing the wall of a giant thunderstorm.
May 23, 2021
I read this book in preparation for a trip to Africa, to some of the same places he visited. He makes it sound like the wildlife was so decimated at the time of his work that I really wonder what we'll fine 30 years later.
July 21, 2013
Interesting descriptions of traveling in Africa in a light plane 20 years ago. Some of the info is quite dated it's decimating to read of the slaughter of animals -but he is with those who were doing something about it.
December 12, 2015
African Silences by Peter Matthiessen (Random House 1991) (916.04) is a record of trips the author made to Africa in the 1970's in which he documented the disappearance of much of the wildlife of the lesser-known portions of central and west Africa. My rating: 7/10, finished 9/9/13.
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January 25, 2016African Silences serves as a time capsule of the conditions of both humans and animals deriving their living from the jungles and rain forests of central and western Africa. I recommend it to anyone who has more than a passing interest in life on Earth.
July 25, 2016
Written about 30 years ago, elegiac, an adventure story, a travel tale...a glimpse into the heart of Africa. What a life Mr. Matthiessen lived and how fortunate for us that he had such passion for our natural world, along with a gift for writing about it so compellingly.
November 17, 2008
Not as good as "The Snow Leopard," but a well written work about Africa and the damage that has been done to its animal populations.
Want to read
November 20, 2010travels in east & central africa --
May 25, 2016
Part travel journal, part natural history, this is what I expected from the Matthiessen.
March 28, 2018
Kinda drags on, but records the decline of the wild animal population which is so much worse now.
Displaying 1 - 24 of 24 reviews