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"There are some things which cannot be learned quickly, and time, which is all we have, must be paid heavily for their acquiring. They are the very simplest things, and because it takes a man's life to know them the little new that each man gets from life is very costly and the only heritage he has to leave."

-- ERNEST HEMINGWAY

In the winter of 1933, Ernest Hemingway and his wife Pauline set out on a two-month safari in the big-game country of East Africa, camping out on the great Serengeti Plain at the foot of magnificent Mount Kilimanjaro. "I had quite a trip," the author told his friend Philip Percival, with characteristic understatement.

Green Hills of Africa is Hemingway's account of that expedition, of what it taught him about Africa and himself. Richly evocative of the region's natural beauty, tremendously alive to its character, culture, and customs, and pregnant with a hard-won wisdom gained from the extraordinary situations it describes, it is widely held to be one of the twentieth century's classic travelogues.

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Death is an old friend

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Hemingway was a depressive who had a special relationship with death. His excellent--essentially true--tale, 'The Green Hills of Africa' highlights this relationship. No, not because it the killing integral to hunting but because it highlights disappointment and, to a certain extent, selfishness. Hemingway is altogether human. He doesn't always bag the best trophy. His trophies are smaller or 'uglier' than those of his friend. It is a source of personal disappointment. Having hunted almost everwhere for almost everything, I know that luck is just that 'luck'. It bears no relationship to effort or even expertise. Sometimes the least likely hunter is blessed and the old pro, who knows all the tricks and kills himself with effort, goes off empty-handed or with a lesser animal. Actually this is exactly what keeps most of us hunting...the gamble. Like a gambling addict we keep at it because the highs and lows are just so compelling. Hemingway, in his own way, knew this and he recognized it's necessity and inevitability. Hemingway knew death and his disappointment was death in a very tight package. At age 61 he took a shotgun and blew his head off. No surprise and perhaps inevitable. Ron Braithwaite author of novels--'Skull Rack' and 'Hummingbird God'--on the Spanish Conquest of Mexico

An African hunter's first book	Customer Rating:
If you are planning a trip to Africa and don't read Hemingway you are doing yourself a great disservice.

Wonderful, classic read.	Customer Rating:
This is one of Ernest Hemingways' best!(And there were some of his I did not like at all) You Must read this!

not the best of hemingway's

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some highlights: the swahili word "m'uzuri" meaning good or well reminds hemingway of missouri. such classical hemingway wry humor. also, "simba" is another swahili word that i had the pleasure of learning in this book, which reminds ME of the disney beloved character, of course. (and jason raize, who played the adult simba on broadway who died tragically too young--look him up, people!) the few pages in chapter one where hemingway met a guy in africa who has heard of hemingway from a lit magazine were excellent. it's hemingway pointing to the sources of great american writings. mark twain's huck topped this chart. moby-dick was mentioned, of course. and henry james (the "two most beautiful words in the english language" as the great--yet not really well known--american poet jim crenner says). having stated all this, i think this is one of hemingway's weakest books i've ever read. his occasional incredibly long sentences that he does so breathtakingly, magnificently well in other books don't seem to live up to the golden standard that i've seen. the details of the hunt are bloody. bloody boring, that is, at some points. this is hemingway's second attempt at non-fiction so i'd be interested in checking out his tome of a book on bull-fighting. tho, as any lover of hemingway's writings would know, my lukewarm reaction to "green hills" doesn't even put a tiny dent on my great admiration for this remarkable american writer. p.s: i finished this book on friday the 13th, june 2008. and how many chapters are there? i love coincidences like this.

my least favorite hemmingway book.

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this book is annoying. hemmingway's ego is out of control as he tries to make a big man of himself by shooting his way through an array of animals that of course mean him no harm at all. though i love much of his early work, this book makes him seem a truly horrible person. no wonder he had a long string of failed relationships and ultimatley killed himself. who could live with a jackass like this. in the end, he couldn't even stand to live with himself. this is an almost worthless book.