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Africa Dances: through writers' eyes
In Africa Dances , Gorer takes the reader on an odyssey across West Africa, in the company of one of the great black ballet stars of 1930s Paris. It is a devastating critique of colonial rule, which is shown to be destroying African society just as effectively as Christian missionaries undermine indigenous morality.
- GenresTravelNonfictionAfrica
296 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1935
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
April 17, 2024
Wow, I really struggled with this one. Of the other 14 ratings on GR, ten of them are for Four stars! Maybe I missed something, or perhaps the oppressively small print in my cerise Penguin edition got the better of me.
It is largely a work of anthropology, examining the people of West Africa (French West Africa at the time), Senegal and Mali now, but the author wraps in some constant companions and turns it into a journey as well. It was first published in 1935, this edition contains a foreword from the author when it was reprinted 10 years after.
In his foreword, the author called it a '... chastening, and in some ways, humiliating experience tore-read a book one has written ten years before.' But he did not re-edit or alter it as far as I can tell. The foreword is perhaps the most interesting part of the book.
I struggled to connect with the narrative, reading long passages only to find I had no idea what was just outlined. Maybe it was that small print...
The book included some black and white photography, ok, but mostly poor quality and difficult to get more than a vague idea what was happening in each.
Think I will leave it there in analysis!
Can't go beyond 2 stars.
It is largely a work of anthropology, examining the people of West Africa (French West Africa at the time), Senegal and Mali now, but the author wraps in some constant companions and turns it into a journey as well. It was first published in 1935, this edition contains a foreword from the author when it was reprinted 10 years after.
In his foreword, the author called it a '... chastening, and in some ways, humiliating experience tore-read a book one has written ten years before.' But he did not re-edit or alter it as far as I can tell. The foreword is perhaps the most interesting part of the book.
I struggled to connect with the narrative, reading long passages only to find I had no idea what was just outlined. Maybe it was that small print...
The book included some black and white photography, ok, but mostly poor quality and difficult to get more than a vague idea what was happening in each.
Think I will leave it there in analysis!
Can't go beyond 2 stars.
April 17, 2018
An excellent book, despite the colonial idioms and language; Gorer's enthusiasm and honesty and on the whole love of Africa is apparent. French West Africa's colonial masters' brutalism and bigotry is revealed as his journey progresses, (as are the British colonialists). Very well written and would recommend.
April 16, 2025
2 stars
“waltzing around West Africa with Geoff”
I like traveling too, but just because I visit, say Slovenia, for a couple of months, doesn’t mean I’m an expert and should write a book. I don’t even speak Slovenian. I can write about my trip, about people I met, etc. but I won’t kid myself that I know Slovenia. So the author went to French West Africa and the (British) Gold Coast (now Ghana) back in the 1930s, hired a car, a driver, and taking an African ballet dancer famous in Europe, set off. He wrote a few pages about Senegal from where they entered what is now Mali, then through Burkina Faso, Benin and Togo, and then the Gold Coast. Finally, traversing the Ivory Coast, he returned to Dakar, his starting point. It’s an interesting journey and I enjoyed reading his observations of the French colonies 90 years ago. BUT. This self-styled anthropologist seems to have no anthropological training whatsoever. In his three month trip through a vast area full of different peoples and languages, he never mentions the word “anthropology” nor does he refer to any other author. So, I conclude that this is purely a travel book in which our author is given to a large number of observations which, lacking any African language or extended stay in any one place, can only be the impressions of an outsider. He consistently calls all Africans “negroes” with a small “n” but shows a lot of sympathy, siding with them against the brutal behaviour of the French colonists and officials, recognizing the deep racism of their rule. He tells of many atrocities and sees Africans as humans instead of just “primitives”. At one point he writes of the French, “They are making a desert and they call it a colony.”
It’s not till he gets to Benin—then called Dahomey—that he sees and can describe dances and ceremonies because the French officials usually forbid the Africans to perform or just hurried him off as soon as they could. If the first part of the book is mainly travel, the second part is made up of descriptions of the costumes and dances he saw plus a brief section about the Vodun religion and the beliefs its followers had. This is not anthropology exactly. What we find are generalizations galore. How accurate or prescient are they? Well, on the last page he predicts that the Black Africans, as a vanishing race, would become extinct!
So, yeah, you know, I think that kind of sums up the understanding he got.
April 15, 2025
“waltzing around West Africa with Geoff”
I like traveling too, but just because I visit, say Slovenia, for a couple of months, doesn’t mean I’m an expert and should write a book. I don’t even speak Slovenian. I can write about my trip, about people I met, etc. but I won’t kid myself that I know Slovenia. So the author went to French West Africa and the (British) Gold Coast (now Ghana) back in the 1930s, hired a car, a driver, and taking an African ballet dancer famous in Europe, set off. He wrote a few pages about Senegal from where they entered what is now Mali, then through Burkina Faso, Benin and Togo, and then the Gold Coast. Finally, traversing the Ivory Coast, he returned to Dakar, his starting point. It’s an interesting journey and I enjoyed reading his observations of the French colonies 90 years ago. BUT. This self-styled anthropologist seems to have no anthropological training whatsoever. In his three month trip through a vast area full of different peoples and languages, he never mentions the word “anthropology” nor does he refer to any other author. So, I conclude that this is purely a travel book in which our author is given to a large number of observations which, lacking any African language or extended stay in any one place, can only be the impressions of an outsider. He consistently calls all Africans “negroes” with a small “n” but shows a lot of sympathy, siding with them against the brutal behaviour of the French colonists and officials, recognizing the deep racism of their rule. He tells of many atrocities and sees Africans as humans instead of just “primitives”. At one point he writes of the French, “They are making a desert and they call it a colony.”
It’s not till he gets to Benin—then called Dahomey—that he sees and can describe dances and ceremonies because the French officials usually forbid the Africans to perform or just hurried him off as soon as they could. If the first part of the book is mainly travel, the second part is made up of descriptions of the costumes and dances he saw plus a brief section about the Vodun religion and the beliefs its followers had. This is not anthropology exactly. What we find are generalizations galore. How accurate or prescient are they? Well, on the last page he predicts that the Black Africans, as a vanishing race, would become extinct!
So, yeah, you know, I think that kind of sums up the understanding he got.
April 15, 2025
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews