Wilfred Thesiger, A Life in Pictures by Alexander Maitland (HarperCollins, £30): GAZING out from the glossy dust jacket, his eyes seem transfixed on the next horizon.
Despite his gnarled features, soiled Arab dress, unshaven face and camel stick, he cuts a figure of refinement. This is an English gentleman of old stock.
The image encapsulates Sir Wilfred Thesiger, arguably one of the last true explorers. His life was nothing short of legendary. Spending his early years in Abyssinia and educated at Eton and Oxford, he served in north Africa and the Middle East during the Second World War.
He went on to twice cross the Empty Quarter in Arabia and explore the interior of Oman. During the 1950s he lived with the Marsh Arabs of southern Iraq, taking time out to take in Kurdistan, Morocco, Karakoram and the Hindu Kush.
It helped that as well as being a good writer, he was a consummate photographer, attested to by these magnificent images, selected by his biographer Alexander Maitland. The pictures take us from his youth and early days in Africa through his numerous expeditions to having tea at his mother's Chelsea flat.
Sir Wilfred has framed some of the most desolate and wild places on earth. His depiction of the north-eastern sands of the Empty Quarter, with its solitary figure and ribbed shadows in the sand and ever receding dunes, is haunting in its beauty, while his view of Annapurna is breathtaking. And there are the vivid depictions of the many companions he had, people from a vanished age.
One cannot but fail to be left in awe of the man and his achievements.
Published: 08/03/2005
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