Travels in the interior of Africa

Travels in the Interior of Africa

Humor & Entertainment

Park, Mungo

Humor

Franklin Classics

Travels in the Interior Districts of Africa

History

Africa

Travels

Travel

Dutton

Mungo Park's Travels

Dutton Adult

In 1795, a young Scottish physician set out to explore the course of the Niger River. The detailed notes from his arduous two-year adventure in West Africa provided Europeans with their first reliable account of the region. Two centuries later, this early classic of travel literature offers a singular array of geographic and anthropological observations of Africa before colonial influence.Unlike the leaders of latter-day expeditions, Mungo Park often traveled alone, trusting locals to supply food, shelter, and directions. His firsthand observations of gold mining, the slave trade, war, and politics, along with his experiences of everyday life, offer unparalleled views of eighteenth-century Africa. National Geographic placed Park's Travels at #25 on its 100 Greatest Adventure Books of All Time. T. Coraghessan Boyle pronounced it "an adventure story to cap them all," and the book's acclaim and influence extends through generations of authors, including Wordsworth, Melville, Conrad, and Hemingway.

Dover Publications

Travels in the Interior of Africa: Volume 1 (Large Print Edition)

BiblioLife

Travels in the Interior of Africa: Volume 2 (Large Print Edition)

Travels in the Interior of Africa: Volume 2

Mungo Park’s Travels in the Interior Districts of Africa has long been regarded as a classic of African travel literature. In fulfilling his mission to find the Niger River and in documenting its potential as an inland waterway for trade, Park was significant in opening Africa to European economic interests. His modest, low-key heroism made it possible for the British public to imagine themselves as a welcomed force in Africa. As a tale of adventure and survival, it has inspired the imaginations of readers since its first publication in 1799 and writers from Wordsworth and Melville to Conrad, Hemingway, and T. Coreghessan Boyle have acknowledged the influence of Park’s narrative on their work. Unlike the large expeditions that followed him, Park traveled only with native guides or alone. Without much of an idea of where he was going, he relied entirely on local people for food, shelter, and directions throughout his eventful eighteen month journey. While his warm reaction to the people he met made him famous as a sentimental traveler, his chronicle also provides a rare written record of the lives of ordinary people in West Africa before European intervention. His accounts of war, politics, and the spread of Islam, as well as his constant confrontations with slavery as practiced in eighteenth-century West Africa, are as valuable today as they were in 1799. In preparing this new edition, editor Kate Ferguson Marsters presents the complete text and includes reproductions of all the original maps and illustrations. Park’s narrative serves as a crucial text in relation to scholarship on the history of slavery, colonial enterprise, and nineteenth-century imperialism. The availability of this full edition will give a new generation of readers access to a travel narrative that has inspired other readers and writers over two centuries and will enliven scholarly discussion in many fields.

Duke University Press Books

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