Out of Africa (Modern Library)

Without a question, this is one of the finest, most well written, sensitive, moving books I have ever read.

My favorite movie of all time. The book is not as good as the movie.

Out of Africa is Karen Blixen's memoir about her years in Africa, writing as Isak Dinesen. She recounts the world of Africa, specifically Kenya. It is, like the England of her friend Denys Finch-Hatton, "a world that no longer existed" even then and certainly as she left it. The memoir is a slow read, yet a book with prose in which you can luxuriate, or languish perhaps as it seems to mirror the mammoth African landscape. Reading like a pastoral novel, the narrator interested me with her myriad experiences. It presents people, cultures, landscape, and wildlife through her eyes, sometimes noble, sometimes paternal. The culture of the various tribes and religions with whom she had contact on her coffee farm became almost real, so that as I read certain moments became funny or sad or wistful. The reader comes to view animals differently, the fecundity of life struck me particularly. The different forces at work are both natural and foreign; the paradoxical nature of the presence of two churches (Roman Catholic and Church of Scotland) is sometimes presented as working for good yet other times it is in conflict. Blixen's memoir is truly literate and the importance of books and writing is evident throughout. Early in the memoir she tries to explain her wirting a book to a native. Near the end of her stay as she is selling off the furniture and other estate provisions their is a poignant moment when, as she sits on her remaining books, she comments:
"Books in a colony play a different part in your existence from what they do in Europe; there is a whole side of your life which they alone take charge of ... you feel more grateful to them, or more indignant with them, than you will ever do in civilized countries." (p.373)
Blixen's memoir of this "uncivilised" land is both memorable and effective in sweeping the reader away into a very different world. Definitely a worthwhile read.

The two-cassette abridgment was way too limiting for such a magnificent book. Also disappointing was the fact that the product was a rejected one from a public library, and the second tape was stretched and half of the second tape was not able to be heard. This product should never have been sold in this condition.

This was the first of many books I've read about Africa. At the time, I had a romanticized view of The Dark Continent, a naieve view.
After doing some more research, I realize Karen Blixen's view was VERY romanticized....to the extent that many of her contemporaries thought her somewhat odd and out of touch with reality.
If you want a lyrically told story colored with emotion...this is for you.
If you're interested in Africa as it really was, read the many accounts extant by settlers who spent far more time, and ranged over a wider area.