Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #20463 in Books
• Published on: 2008-03-06
• Binding: Paperback
• 592 pages

Review
'Superb ... Tim Jeal's absorbing biography will surely be definitive. The story of how an emotionally damaged Victorian pauper opened up the Dark Continent is an extraordinary one, and Jeal has written a great book - shrewd, perceptive and engaging.' --Sunday Telegraph

'Magnificent ... There have been many biographies of Stanley, but Jeal's is the most felicitous, the best informed, the most complete and readable.' --Paul Theroux, New York Times Book Review

Sunday Times
'An absorbing, sometimes horrifying biography ... a feat of
advocacy - an ardent, intricate defence of a man history has damned.'

The Scotsman
'Stunningly comprehensive ... a rollicking read as well as moving,
incisive study of one man's restless, evolving character and ambitions.'

Customer Reviews

The dramatic life of a towering figure grippingly told
I have rarely read such a riveting book as this one. The story of Stanley's life is extraordinary and dramatic enough in itself, and Tim Jeal tells it with the vividness that we are accustomed to from his earlier superb biographies of Livingstone and Baden-Powell. But the book is not just a gripping read, it is also an eye-opener. Having had access to previously unused documents, Jeal gives us for the first time a full picture of the real Stanley, who emerges as a towering figure of enormous significance in the history of Africa. Jeal's account of his involvement in the Congo, for example, vindicates Stanley from the charges that have often been levelled against him. While we are shown his warts, Stanley comes across as fundamentally decent and likeable human being. This is a book to which I shall return.

An outstanding biography
Think you know all about Stanley? He asked, "Dr Livingstone, I presume?" Right? Wrong actually. And lots else is wrong about the usual way Stanley is seen. He tried to oppose Leopold's land grab on the Congo rather than carried it out, and was appalled by what went on there after he left Africa. The author of this book has seen scores of letters no-one else has read and retells Stanley's amazing story as it really happened and not as his enemies later made out. A fascinating and convincing revisionary read.

An exciting unputdownable book.
They don't make heroes any more like the Victorians, but not even they made more than one Stanley. He was bombastic, he lied, he was desperate for love, he created a new identity for himself, he deserted twice from the US forces in the Civil War, he prospected for gold, he became a famous journalist, he thought up the biggest journalistic scoop of the 19th century and then he sorted out the Nile/Congo sources. He went back to Africa again and again even after classic near death experiences. And this was a boy who spent ten years of his childhood in a workhouse which his family never visited. Why didn't he just give up? This is a stunning book about the human will to survive and make something of life. You feel you are with Stanley in the jungle and on the great rivers. You understand what it took to travel aross the continent when malaria killed scores of explorers. No maps, no transport except human porterage, and walking for months and even years and facing more dangers than can be imagined. Yet Stanley needed love like the rest of us and after numerous disasters, eventually found it. A terrific unputdownable book.