★★★★☆ | Travel and Nature | Print | Own | StoryGraph | Goodreads
I enjoyed these episodic adventures in the wilds of South Africa amongst elephants and the incredible struggle to preserve and cohabitate with these massive and intelligent animals. An Immense World by Ed Yong introduced me to the ways in which elephants see the world from a scientific basis. Here, the author tells the story from practical experience.
Anthony is a good storyteller. Much of the book feels more like a suspense novel than memoir. The writing isn’t great, but the stories are good enough to look past that.
What I didn’t expect was the sadness mixed in with the joy. There were hard losses sprinkled throughout the book that spoke to the necessary interchange between growth and decline, life and death. I was pretty emotional at the end with the loss of two brave souls, one then the other.
I was saddened to learn that Anthony passed away a few short years after publishing this book. May he rest in peace with the knowledge of the incredible legacy he left behind.
Highlights
The Zulus who live close to the land have a saying that if it rains on an inaugural occasion, that event will be blessed. For those in step with the natural world, rain is life. (Page 25)
Every wild thing is in tune with its surroundings, awake to its fate and in absolute harmony with the planet. Their attention is focused totally outwards. Humans, on the other hand, tend to focus introspectively on their own lives too often, brooding and magnifying problems that the animal kingdom would not waste a millisecond of energy upon. To most people, the magnificent order of the natural world where life and death actually mean something has become unrecognizable. (Page 249)
Thula’s death affected everybody, particularly Françoise. I have never seen her sob so bitterly. We’ve had lots of animals living with us over the years and we were close to them all but with Thula it was different. Her cheerful disposition, her refusal to surrender until the last few days inspired everyone. She had shown us how life could be joyous despite pain; meaningful despite brevity. How life should be lived for the moment. The pall of sorrow she left behind was for many days impenetrable. (Page 328)