One of the last gentlemen explorers, he travelled and wrote exensively about the people in northern Africa and the MiddleEast.
Wilfred Wilfred Thesiger has often been called the last of the great Victorian travelers, born half a century after his time. Had he been born any later he would have found that most of the areas he explored had been destroyed. Today, the geographical barriers to entering Wilfred Thesiger's areas of wilderness have largely been replaced by those of a more political nature. Iraq and Afghanistan have been troubled by wars for many years, and the recent turmoil in Ethiopia has occupied much of our thoughts in recent times. Wilfred Thesiger's admiration for the nomadic way of life, evident in all his work, has led him to despise the conveniences of modern life - cars, industrialisation etc - which first threatened, then caused so much destruction. Wilfred Thesiger has been a visionary because he expressed such views when few doubted that the irrepressible march of science was for the ultimate benefit of all mankind. Unable to change his world, he abandoned it for another, and so began a life which has produced a number of unique and highly collectable travel books.
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