The Zanzibar Chest: A Memoir of Love and War

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The majority of Africa went from being ruled by Europe and the people being treated like shit, to being ruled by dictators who the people either elected or who took over via a coup, and treated the people like shit. And when those leaders were toppled a new madman dictator took their place, to loot the country and treat the people like shit. This is why there are certainly no easy answers to fixing Africa, if in fact there is a fix. And there are hundreds of other moving/funny/incredible/horrifying sentences in this book-the above are entirely random. Mesmerizing. . . . A Sweeping, poetic homage to Africa, a continent made vivid by Hartley’s capable, stunning prose.”— Publishers Weekly (starred review) d) All conditions, notices, descriptions, statements and other matters in the catalogue and elsewhere concerning any lot are subject to any statements modifying or affecting the same made by the Auctioneer from the rostrum prior to any bid being accepted for the lot.

In the Nineteenth Century, Europeans were attracted to the wealth of the tiny island. It was such an obvious trading entrepot and was one of the few places in Africa that had plenty of cash. It was also helpful that the island climate was more accommodating to Europeans and there were less nasty diseases to afflict them than in most of the rest of the continent. It was a natural hub of civilisations, even if much of the wealth was a by-product of slavery. At night, lions grunted and roared and the hollow volcanic hill rumbled as rhino cantered by … “We were in a paradise,” said my father, “that we can never forget, nor equal.”Insurance:The Auctioneers will insure lots at the lower end of their pre-sale estimate or initial agreed reserve, whichever is the greater value, if the items have not been sold. Hannam’s Auctioneers Ltd will not be responsible for loss or damage to the exterior features of Paintings (frames or glass), Prints or Watercolours, or for loss or damage to any property caused by temperature change, handing errors or humidity changes. The Auctioneers reserve the right to cancel any sale at any time, should they deem it necessary, this will be at Hannam’s Auctioneers Ltd discretion. In his quest for belonging, Hartley intertwines his own war stories with the tale of Peter Davey, a romantic young British officer and friend of his father, who was murdered in Aden in 1947 and whose diaries he finds in his dead father's Zanzibar chest. There are similarities between Davey and Hartley, two white men in savage lands. But Hartley strives for a more poetic connection. He believes Davey's death represented his father's loss of innocence, just as he himself was transformed by Africa's wars. By uncovering the details of Davey's life, he hopes to connect with his father, and so with his forefathers. The Zanzibar Chest’ is a powerful story about a man witnessing and confronting extreme violence and being broken down by it, and of a son trying to come to terms with the death of a father whom he also saw as his best friend. It charts not only a love affair between two people, but also the British love affair with Arabia and the vast emptinesses of the desert, which become a fitting metaphor for the emotional and spiritual condition in which Hartley finds himself. It is a complicated book. A white Kenyan, born of a line of colonial adventurers, Hartley is less concerned with the wars he reported, in Ethiopia, Somalia, Burundi and Rwanda, than with his place in them. In journalism, he saw an opportunity to re-engage with the continent of his birth, yet his experience of Africa's postcolonial dismantling seems only to confirm he doesn't belong.

A powerful blend of family history and war correspondent’s memoir…searing, deeply instructive.’ Anthony Daniels, Sunday Telegraph

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A work of tremendous candor and vigor. Passionately articulated, The Zanzibar Chest offers a vision of Africa through the eyes of the war reporter that is unsettling, compelling and moving by turns. Reportage, history, family memoir and personal testimony intertwine in a work of passion and intensity to create a book that is impossible to forget.”—Aminatta Forna, author of The Devil that Danced on the Water confirm that you are authorised to provide credit/debit card details to Lots Road Auctions through www.the-saleroom.com Hartley believes he has forged an identity in Africa at last, through witnessing its suffering. Given his distant response to the victims, it is an awkward conclusion. As a quest for belonging, his years on the road seem more likely to have been a failure. Yet his recollection of them is gripping, and often intensely moving. The Shirazi chests were particularly elaborate, as Unwin describes, with “sparse heavy cast brass plating ... [and] diamond-shaped disks.” One of the rare dated examples belonged to Sayyida Salme, the daughter of the early 19th-century Omani sultan of Zanzibar Said bin Sultan al-Said, and it is now in the Sultan’s palace. Salme married a German merchant in 1866 and fled Zanzibar, which gives a probable date for the chest. Married as Emily Ruete, her autobiography, Memoirs of an Arabian Princess, published n 1907, sheds unique light on the period.

Almost all but the most impoverished women would bring with them the basics needed to set up house. Giving money to enable girls to marry has been a charitable act in much of the Muslim as well as the Christian worlds, and, indeed, the custom of Santa Claus and Christmas gift-giving is thought to have originated with St. Nicholas of Myra (modern Demre in Turkey), who secretly provided money to dowry-less girls. The Zanzibar Chest] is thrillingly charged with an undercurrent of passion.”—Suzy Hansen, Salon.comNote: Hannam’s Auctioneers Ltd reserves the right to alter these Terms and Conditions without notification to clients. Note: Due to Coronavirus Restrictions collections are by appointment only and therefore cannot be facilitated during an auction at this time.

A splendiferous pastiche of Africa wisdom, youthful exuberance, nostalgia, love, adventure and despair set in a world of constant and seldom-positive change. . . . Cynicism wrestles with idealism throughout the book. . . . Hartley’s stories, told here, are an act of bravery. They should be read.”—Roy Durfee, The Santa Fe New Mexican From the Dir Valley in northern Pakistan, this chest is carved from Himalayan cedar. Its pieces are joined, not nailed. Its legs are part of its design, and their rise above the lid is characteristic of the region’s style. The wooden tab on the right is used to pull open a front panel.

As a boy I asked my mother why our great-grandpas and our great-grannies from families of Yorkshire farmers and Scottish doctors felt the need to leave home and travel all over the world. What I found in the Zanzibar chest was a story of lives so utterly differ­ent from my own, so exotic, set in another part of the world and in another time. I had never believed in any great cause; I was sent to fight no wars. What I admired most about my father, Davey, and those like them is that they were men of action, whereas I was ever the observer, not the participant, which is the main reason why I’m able to be here to tell this story.