The Last Banana

Overland through Egypt and Sudan, by camel into Ethiopia (in the last days of Haile Selassie) and Kenya to Tanganyika. In 1971, Tucker was invited by a Greek contemporary at Oxford to join him in Tanganyika. Marios Ghikas owned so much land there that when he went for a walk in his garden he effectively went on safari. 'I'm about to be Africanized,' he tells Tucker. 'And I was saving the last banana for you. Come and help me spend this unremittable fortune.' The Greeks, Marios had told him, were important in the history of Europe's engagement with Africa. Herodotus had written the first geography, social anthropology and history of Egypt in the 5th century BC and for nearly 1000 years Alexandria, founded by Greeks had been the most important city in Africa. But could Tucker afford to interrupt his work to take up Ghikas' invitation? Would Carole, his would-be wife wait for him? All the demoralizing beauty and sunlight of an African adventure beckoned. Carole wrote to an elder of her tribe. 'Go before it vanishes,' he replied. Variously described as brave, lunatic, old-fashioned, heroic, Tucker has been recognized as an outstanding and distinguished new writer.
His new book promises to be as compelling, original and enlightening as his first. Footnotes: In 1972 Shelby and Carole were married in Zanzibar in a cathedral built in 1876 on the site of the old slave market to commemorate the end of the slave trade. Last year the Republic of Tanzania asked Marios to take back his farm. History has come full circle.