BOA

The Memoirs of a Banana Planter

in Remote West Africa

Books saved my sanity time and time again. When I was in England on leave, I used to tour country auction sales for books - which I used to buy in bulk. One of the advantages of the banana boats which were used to transport our fruit was that they returned to England full and went out to Africa empty. This meant that you could send out as much baggage as you wanted. After a home leave, I would often return with a ton or more of books, picked up in job lots at Country Houses or old Vicarages for pence: in fact the auctioneers would often only sell the books and the bookcases together - they were frightened that nobody would bid for the books.

I ended up with a wide-ranging miscellany of books. I never sorted them before shipping. They were just packed into tea chests and sent to the boat. Once in Africa, I arranged them in bookcases - the camp carpenter made superb bookcases with pit-sawn timber. Then I read them in sequence: it was difficult to be strong-minded about this, but once you started being selective you would read the interesting ones first and never get around to reading the boring ones (or at least the ones which appeared to be boring at first sight). Of course it meant that I acquired a strange sort of knowledge - of theology, classics, history, literature, travel, poetry, science, natural history, politics, economics and such like - but it was a great form of escapism from the trials and tribulations of the life - and the loneliness, which at times was almost unbearable.

It took time to adapt to the loneliness. Damascus would serve dinner, on a non-harvest day, at half past six. I would go to the table with the inevitable book and after dinner he would bring coffee and a bottle of Spanish brandy. Then I was by myself - by myself except for the drums. The camp was close enough to hear them - so always, just always, there was the everlasting maddening insistent beat of the drums. Most sounds you get used to: dogs barking, the hum of traffic, the throb of an engine, the sound of aeroplanes, even a noisy band - but you never ever get used to the strange intense rhythm of the drums. They would start drumming just as I was about to have dinner and they would continue for four or five hours every evening. They had an insistent monotony and a sense of foreboding that combined with the heavy oppressive heat to give an overwhelming feeling of depression and fear.

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Last Modified: 30 October 2000