The Masque of Africa
17 June 2011Imprint: Picador
Synopsis
Moving beyond travelogue, V. S. Naipaul's The Masque of Africa considers the effects of belief (in indigenous animisms, the foreign religions of Christianity and Islam, the cults of leaders and mythical history) upon the progress of African civilization. Beginning in Uganda, at the centre of the continent, Naipaul’s journey takes in Ghana and Nigeria, the Ivory Coast and Gabon, and...
Details
17 June 2011336 pages
9780330472043Imprint: Picador
Reviews
Compelling, insightful, often somberly beautiful.Sunday Telegraph
Naipaul travels, he asks, he listens attentively and, above all else, he notices, often seeing what others do not or cannot. That acute gift has never left him . . . he is sustained by the old ideal of unadorned truth-telling.New Statesman
The quality of Naipaul’s writing – simple, concise, engaging – rarely varies . . . Above all, Naipaul’s latest African journey is eyewitness reporting at its best.Time
