Wild at Heart: Man and Beast in Southern Africa
An extraordinary combination of photographs and words portrays the challenges and possibilities of Southern Africa in an inspiring new light.
The efforts to preserve and sustain wildlife in Africa are confounding and often contradictory. The rights of the human and animal inhabitants often conflict. Well-intentioned conservation projects – providing readily available water year-round for animals, moving herds of elephants to better protected parks – can have unintended and disastrous consequences.
“Wild at Heart: Man and Beast in Southern Africa” is an extraordinarily beautiful, moving and provocative book that explores these issues and celebrates the wild treasures that are the focus of these efforts. Photographed by National Geographic’s Chris Johns, with insightful background and commentary by Zimbabwe-born journalist Peter Godwin and a stirring foreword by Nelson Mandela, the book presents a rare synthesis of image and word. The photographs present fresh perspectives on man and beast – from Bushmen and other regional tribes to lions, elephants, cheetahs, wild dogs and more – and are striking in and of themselves; coupled with Godwin’s learned text, they become teaching tools, portals into the traditions and challenges of Southern Africa.
“Wild at Heart” penetratingly portrays the enormous challenges facing those who are determined to conserve and cultivate Africa’s wildness, but it also signals some optimistic examples that suggest pathways to future success. With each chapter simultaneously stunning, informing and inspiring, “Wild at Heart” is an enabling and ennobling triumph.
[Wild at Heart: Man and Beast in Southern Africa; photographs by Chris Johns and essays by Peter Godwin, with a foreword by Nelson Mandela; published by the National Geographic Society; hardcover; 176 pages; $65.]
Adventure Collection members Bushtracks Expeditions, Micato Safaris, Geographic Expeditions, Natural Habitat Adventures, and Backroads offer a wide range of trips throughout Africa. For more information on their itineraries, visit their web sites or the Adventure Collection’s Trip Finder.
For more books on Africa, visit Longitude Books.
