Too Close to the Sun: The Life and Times of Denys Finch Hatton

New
Paperback
2007
$13.79

Conservationist, scholar, soldier, white hunter and fabled lover - Denys Finch Hatton was an aristocrat of leonine nonchalance. After a dazzling career at Eton and Oxford, he sailed in 1910 for British East Africa - still then the land of the pioneer. Sara Wheeler reveals the truth behind his love affairs with the glamorous aviatrix Beryl Markham, and - famously - with Karen Blixen, a romance immortalised in her memoir Out of Africa. 'No one who ever met him', his Times obituary concluded, 'whether man or woman, old or young, white or black, failed to come under his spell'.

Synopsis

Conservationist, scholar, soldier, white hunter and fabled lover - Denys Finch Hatton was an aristocrat of leonine nonchalance. After a dazzling career at Eton and Oxford, he sailed in 1910 for British East Africa - still then the land of the pioneer. Sara Wheeler reveals the truth behind his love affairs with the glamorous aviatrix Beryl Markham, and - famously - with Karen Blixen, a romance immortalised in her memoir Out of Africa. 'No one who ever met him', his Times obituary concluded, 'whether man or woman, old or young, white or black, failed to come under his spell'.

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More Information

Format: Paperback
Pages: 304
Edition: New Ed
Publisher: Vintage
Published: 01 Mar 2007
ISBN 10: 0099450275
ISBN 13: 9780099450276
Book Overview: A brilliant new biography by the acclaimed author of Cherry and Terra Incognita.

Media Reviews

A good story... a fitting memorial * Observer *
A fascinating story of a man trying to outrun the social upheavals of the twentieth century * Herald *
Wheeler has made excellent use of the sources at hand... Moreover, Wheeler writes well, and has a gift - shared by only very few - for pinning down the smells and atmosphere of the African landscape * Literary Review *
She dazzles the reader with an evocation of time and place.. her description of the east Africa Campaign is detailed and enthralling -- Keith Dovkants * Scotsman *
She writes beautifully, with a vivid turn of phrase, a sound grasp of history and an impish humour -- Andrew Lycett * Sunday Times *

Author Bio

Sara Wheeler's books include the international bestseller Terra Incognita: Travels in Antarctica, of which the Telegraph reviewer wrote, `I do not think there will ever be a better book on the Antarctic.' The Magnetic North: Notes from the Arctic Circle, was chosen as Book of the Year by Will Self, Michael Palin, A. N. Wilson and others. She has published two biographies of travellers: Cherry: A Life of Apsley Cherry-Garrard, and Too Close to the Sun: The Life and Times of Denys Finch Hatton, and was immensely relieved to write about women at last in O My America!. She lives in London.