Books, Arts & Manners: Old Stone Age

The Life of My Choice, by Wilfred Thesiger (Norton, 459 pp., $25)

I met the formidable Wilfred Thesiger at his Victorian flat in Chelsea in April 1979. He had been living among “my Samburu” near Lake Rudolf in northern Kenya, and seemed well suited to the austere life of these naked warriors. Formal, reserved, and taciturn, he would lapse into silence after briefly answering my questions. I finally roused him by asking about the gold medal that the Royal Geographical Society had awarded him for crossing the Empty Quarter of Arabia and about his attitude toward T. E. Lawrence, whom he greatly admired. As we shook hands in farewell, I sensed the power of the explorer, soldier, and hunter as well as the sensitivity of the greatest travel writer of our time.

About the Author

Jeffrey Meyers

Mr. Meyers is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and the author of John Huston: Courage and Art.

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The Life of My Choice, by Wilfred Thesiger (Norton, 459 pp., $25)

I met the formidable Wilfred Thesiger at his Victorian flat in Chelsea in April 1979. He had been living among “my Samburu” near Lake Rudolf in northern Kenya, and seemed well suited to the austere life of these naked warriors. Formal, reserved, and taciturn, he would lapse into silence after briefly answering my questions. I finally roused him by asking about the gold medal that the Royal Geographical Society had awarded him for crossing the Empty Quarter of Arabia and about his attitude toward T. E. Lawrence, whom he greatly admired. As we shook hands in farewell, I sensed the power of the explorer, soldier, and hunter as well as the sensitivity of the greatest travel writer of our time.