Book Details
Format
Paperback
Pages
246
Language
English
Published
Jan 1, 1973
Publisher
Penguin Books
Description
This is a sequence, part fiction, part documentary, and at its heart is a novel of great brilliance.
The novel is set in a free state of Africa at a time of civil conflict when a once-ruling tribe is being decimated. But for English people like Bobby and Linda, driving back from the capital to their expatriates' compound the roads are open. Neutral, white, protected, they have both in their different ways found liberation in Africa, and they too might be said to be 'in a free state'. But their neutrality will not last; there is a danger on the open road.
Exploiter and exploited: it is one of the conditions of life in a free state that the roles should ceaselessly shift. This is not the Africa of romance or 'service', but something infinitely more ambiguous.
The novel is set in a free state of Africa at a time of civil conflict when a once-ruling tribe is being decimated. But for English people like Bobby and Linda, driving back from the capital to their expatriates' compound the roads are open. Neutral, white, protected, they have both in their different ways found liberation in Africa, and they too might be said to be 'in a free state'. But their neutrality will not last; there is a danger on the open road.
Exploiter and exploited: it is one of the conditions of life in a free state that the roles should ceaselessly shift. This is not the Africa of romance or 'service', but something infinitely more ambiguous.