DownloadThe Portobello Bookshop Gift Guide 2024

The King of the World in the Land of the Pygmies

Joan T Mark author

Format:Paperback

Publisher:University of Nebraska Press

Published:1st Dec '98

Currently unavailable, and unfortunately no date known when it will be back

The King of the World in the Land of the Pygmies cover

Joan Mark offers an interpretive biography of Patrick Tracy Lowell Putnam (1904–53), who spent twenty-five years living among the Bambuti pygmies of the Ituri Forest in what is now Zaire. On the Epulu River he constructed Camp Putnam as a harmonious multiracial community. He modeled his camp on the “dude ranches” of the American West, taking in paying guests while running a medical clinic and occasionally offering legal aid to the local people, and assumed the role of intermediary between locals and visitors, including Colin M. Turnbull, author of the classic Forest People. Mark describes Putnam’s mercurial relations with family and with his African and American wives—and follows him to his sad and violent end. She places Patrick Putnam within the context of three different anthropological traditions and examines his contribution as an expert on pygmies.

"[A] fine book, a carefully considered character study that quickly turns into a psychological page-turner."-Boston Book Review Boston Book Review "The engrossing story of a true eccentric who fled his family of prominent Bostonians to set up a little kingdom in colonial Africa."-Publishers Weekly Publishers Weekly "An enthralling blend of biography and travel writing."-Booklist Booklist "Chronicles the erratic saga of this charismatic man."-New York Times Book Review New York Times Book Review "Compelling ... like a grand guignol novel."-Anthropos Anthropos "An intelligent biography of a quixotic American."-Kirkus Reviews Kirkus Reviews

ISBN: 9780803282506

Dimensions: unknown

Weight: 454g

276 pages