Wilfred Thesiger: The Life of the Great Explorer.

WILFRED THESIGER THE LIFE OF THE GREAT EXPLORER By Alexander Maitland published by HarperCollins ISBN 0 00 255608 1 price 25.00 [pounds sterling] hardback

While Wilfred Thesiger's own classic writings cover his journeys (including The Marsh Arabs, Arabian Sands, Desert, Marsh and Mountain, The Life of My Choice and My Kenya Days) amongst the Marsh Arabs in southern Iraq, across the Empty Quarter in Arabia, they fail conspicuously to shed light on his character and motives, which have remained an enigma.

Maitland's biography had Thesiger's support before he died in 2003, and has been written with full access, granted to no one else, to the rich Thesiger archive of vivid, intimate family correspondence, and his own letters, diaries and notebooks which are far more confiding than his scrupulously edited published accounts. Maitland investigates in depth Thesiger's parents and family influences; his wartime experiences and the ethos of conflict; his philosophy as a hunter and conservationist; his development as a writer and photographer; his close friendships with the Arabs and Africans amongst whom he lived; and his sexuality. This is a major biography of a great and unusual man and an outstanding explorer.