Helpful Score: 3
Beryl Markham writes beautifully, so well that it is like remembering something you had forgotten. She writes about Africa, horses and flying in a mostly non-technical way. It is filled with descriptive prose and philosophical musings. My favorite part: "No map I have flown with has ever been lost or thrown away. I have a trunk containing continents." I think her accounts are true, but at the end of the book you are not left a detailed timeline and an factual account of Africa as much as an impression of what Africa was like while she lived there. This is one of my favorite books.
Helpful Score: 3
This is perhaps my favorite book I've ever read. Plot-wise, it is the autobiography of a woman who grew up in East Africa in the early 20th century. It is marvelous -- the quote from Hemingway should sell it if we can't. There are some racist undertones that are probably appropriate for the time and place of this book, albeit shocking now.
Scholars debate whether this book was actually written by Hemingway himself. He was her lover, and so seldom praised other writers' works. Markham, after penning this masterpiece, never wrote anything else. The book does have a Hemingway flavor to it.
Scholars debate whether this book was actually written by Hemingway himself. He was her lover, and so seldom praised other writers' works. Markham, after penning this masterpiece, never wrote anything else. The book does have a Hemingway flavor to it.
Helpful Score: 3
the most wonderful book I ever read! I love Africa, am a female private pilot and her words put other authors to shame. My husband, who seldom reads female authors, highly recommends this 5 star book to anyone who loves to read!
Helpful Score: 2
This book was so lovely to read, it earned it's place on my shelf of "All-Time Favorite Books To Be Read Again and Again".
Ms. Markham is an excellent story-teller, at the same time self-effacing yet with a beautiful, poetic turn of phrase. Her remarkable adventures as a flyer in 1930's Africa are astounding.
Ms. Markham is an excellent story-teller, at the same time self-effacing yet with a beautiful, poetic turn of phrase. Her remarkable adventures as a flyer in 1930's Africa are astounding.
Helpful Score: 1
Ernest Hemingway himself praised this memoir as so well written: "She (Beryl Markham) can write rings around all of us who consider ourselves as writers." This is a stunning memoir of her life as an aviator in Africa. I thoroughly enjoyed it.
Helpful Score: 1
Born in England in 1902, Markham was taken by her father to East Africa in 1906. She spent her childhood playing with native Maruni children and apprenticing with her father as a trainer and breeder of racehorses. In the 1930s, she became an African bush pilot, and in September 1936, became the first person to fly solo across the Atlantic from east to west.
Markham's use of the English language is so beautifully composed, reading this story is akin to listening to a beautiful symphony!
Beryl Markham is a magnificent, brilliant, talented writer.If you are a student of creative writing , journalism ,or simply a lover of a well written book, I beg you to read this book and anything else she,herself,has written.
Ernest Hemingway wrote a letter to Maxwell Perkins and spoke of this book, "WEST WITH THE NIGHT".Let his words be the review :
"Did you read Beryl Markham's book,WEST WITH THE NIGHT? I knew her fairly well in Africa and never would have suspected that she could and would put pen to paper except to write in her flyer's logbook.As it is, SHE HAS WRITTEN SO WELL,and marvelously well,that I WAS COMPLETELY ASHAMED OF MYSELF AS A WRITER.I felt that I was simply a carpenter with words,picking up whatever was furnished on the job and nailing the together and sometimes making an okay pigpen.But [she] can write rings around all of us who consider ourselves as writers.The only parts of it that I know about personally,on account of having been there at the time and heard the other people's stories, are absolutely true....I wish you would get it and read it because it is really a bloody wonderful book." ( ERNEST HEMINGWAY)
Ernest Hemingway wrote a letter to Maxwell Perkins and spoke of this book, "WEST WITH THE NIGHT".Let his words be the review :
"Did you read Beryl Markham's book,WEST WITH THE NIGHT? I knew her fairly well in Africa and never would have suspected that she could and would put pen to paper except to write in her flyer's logbook.As it is, SHE HAS WRITTEN SO WELL,and marvelously well,that I WAS COMPLETELY ASHAMED OF MYSELF AS A WRITER.I felt that I was simply a carpenter with words,picking up whatever was furnished on the job and nailing the together and sometimes making an okay pigpen.But [she] can write rings around all of us who consider ourselves as writers.The only parts of it that I know about personally,on account of having been there at the time and heard the other people's stories, are absolutely true....I wish you would get it and read it because it is really a bloody wonderful book." ( ERNEST HEMINGWAY)
A book I adored in my childhood, still sweet and wonderful now that I'm thirty. Really naturally gifted author, amazing life-story. The treatment of race in the book raises ambiguous feelings in the reader.
wonderful adventure book full of stories about flying, horse racing, Africa, wild critters and her faithful dog. LOVED IT!
Wow, this is a tremendous book. Had not heard of Beryl Markham prior to getting this book but what a wonderful way with words she has. I enjoyed every moment of reading this story.
A gently written book combining Markham's love of flying, Africa and herself. Undoubtedly loaded with great symbolism that flew right over my head. It is a well regarded book, though.
This is my favorite book of all time.
I can't say enough good about this book. My parents had it for quite a while before I decided to read it, because I thought "I'm not interested in flying, in Africa, or what it was like back in the 20s & 30s." But Beryl Markham makes everything profoundly meaningful with her graceful prose and her gift for invoking places, people and situations. Alternately hilarious, poignant, gripping, poetic or tragic, it withstands countless re-readings. Here is a tiny sample, involving a young race-horse & a herd of zebra:
"I think Balmy was aware of the dictum "noblesse oblige," but, for all her mud-rolling, she never got very close to a zebra or even oxen without distending her nostrils in the manner of an eighteenth-century grande dame forced to wade throught the fringes of a Paris mob. As for the zebra, they replied in kind, moving out of her path with the ponderous dignity of righteous proletariat, fortified in their contempt by the weight of their number."
This one story alone is worth the price of admission.
"I think Balmy was aware of the dictum "noblesse oblige," but, for all her mud-rolling, she never got very close to a zebra or even oxen without distending her nostrils in the manner of an eighteenth-century grande dame forced to wade throught the fringes of a Paris mob. As for the zebra, they replied in kind, moving out of her path with the ponderous dignity of righteous proletariat, fortified in their contempt by the weight of their number."
This one story alone is worth the price of admission.
This memoir contains some of the most vivid writing about animals in the wild that I have ever read, anywhere, in 60+ years of reading. I loved the style, insights, narration and characterizations in this book, which recounts her growing up in East Africa, hunting with native and Indian men, learning to become a pilot and having various other adventures. Strongly recommended!
Conemporary of Karen Blixen - they shared a love of Africa and even some of the same fellows. Her story is very different from "Isak Dinesen's" and very interesting.
This autobiography is about a woman who lived and worked in AFrica as a pilot in the 1930's. If you loved the movie/book OUT OF AFRICA, you will love this beautifully written book!
This is Beryl Markham's memoir of growing up in East Africa (she was English). She became interested in aviation and for a while carried mail and supplies to remote corners of Africa. She was the first person to fly solo across the Atlantic going from east to west (England to Nova Scotia). Quite a woman for her time.
I first read this book about 5 years ago and have reread it twice since then. It is beautifully written.
About the author's childhood in Africa.
this book was hard to put down!
This is one of the best biographies I have ever read. Hemmingway said that Beryl Markham showed other writers how it should be done.
A beautifully written book by a woman bush pilot in Africa in the late 30's and early 40's. Earnest Hemingway said that her writing made him look like an amateur. What more need be said?
After reading Circling the Sun, I decided to read another book about Beryl Markham's life. She set records and broke barriers as a pilot. She had many torrid love affairs and survived desperate crash landings. In 1935 she flew solo across the Atlantic. I found this audio to be a great adventure read about a woman who is a true epic. Not a book to be missed!
I rarely read memoirs, but I'm so glad I read this one. Beryl Markham lived a full and fascinating life in a time and place that are long gone. Her writing brings that time and place vividly to life in your mind's eye, and the writing itself is beautiful; I found myself often pausing in my reading, just to savor an image or a turn of phrase.
One of my favorite books!
I read all of the "adventure in africa" books I can find... how did this slip by me all these years, this was excellent!
The book is basically a memoir about growing up in Africa, horses, and flying in the early part of the 20th century. Extremely well written and engaging, I enjoyed it thoroughly.
I've subsequently learned that it may in fact have been penned by Hemingway... maybe or maybe not, but its good enough that it could have been.
The book is basically a memoir about growing up in Africa, horses, and flying in the early part of the 20th century. Extremely well written and engaging, I enjoyed it thoroughly.
I've subsequently learned that it may in fact have been penned by Hemingway... maybe or maybe not, but its good enough that it could have been.
Initially recommended by an Alaskan friend, having just been in Kenya I was fascinated with this book. It's an "easy" read but there's meat on the content bones. Much of it is the story of her growing up in "British East Africa" and some of it is more self-serving than entirely truthful, but it gives a good feel for Africa and for the early years of flight. Her "big" achievement, being the first to fly across the Atlantic from Great Britain going west, was almost a footnote. I enjoyed it and would recommend it.
This is a true account of Beryl Markham and her life in Africa. She was a horse trainer and one of the first women to fly solo across the Atlantic. Her descriptions of Africa are breathtaking. This is the story of a truly remarkable woman!
Got this at a yard sale.
