 Africa Dances
Geoffrey Gorer Pages: 296
Format: Paperback
ISBN: 0 907871 18 6
Area of interest: West Africa
Genre: Travel Date of first publication: 1935
Eland publication date: October 30, 2003
Price: £9.99
Africa Dances takes the reader on an odyssey across West Africa, in the company of one of the great black ballet stars of 1930’s Paris. It is a devastating critique of colonial rule, which is seen to be destroying African society while Christian missionaries undermine indigenous morality.
Africa Dances captures the rich physical and psychological detail of African village life - from food and architecture to witch doctors, dance and magic. Gorer witnesses men diving for three-quarters of an hour without coming up for breath, witch-doctors conjuring thunderstorms out of clear blue skies and chameleon fetishists whose skin changes from a dirty white to almost black. It takes us back to a place where if you believed you could.
biography of Geoffrey Gorer
extract from Africa Dances
"extraordinary ... one of the most remarkable travel books of our time"
Sunday Times "a brilliant travel book by an extremely intelligent young man"
Time and Tide "a book I could not put down from the first page to the last"
Daily Telegraph
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