Some travel writers, in an attempt to simulate the hardship of Victorian journeys, like to impose artificial difficulties on themselves. A glut of memorably foolish yarns with titles like Hang-Gliding to Borneo or To Bognor on a Rhinoceros discredited the genre in the 1980s. In every case it would have been quicker for the authors to take the train. Why wind-surf across the Mojave when there’s a serviceable coach service?
Tim Butcher, formerly a Telegraph war correspondent, is biased towards old- fashioned travellers in the Redmond O’Hanlon mould who, with their bushy side-whiskers and squire-naturalist curiosity, continue a tradition of Victorian exploration. His best-selling Africa adventure, Blood River, followed in the footsteps of Morton Stanley and sought to navigate modern-day Congo chiefly by means of canoe. (Butcher was about 40 at the time.)
His new book, Chasing the Devil, retraces Graham Greene’s 350-mile journey across Sierra Leone and Liberia in 1935. It’s not a bad idea, but Liberia is a different country today, with halfway decent motorbike tracks, jeep roads and bridges. Why go the whole hog on foot? Shunning all comfort, Butcher pushes on through tsetse fly-infested jungle and ‘war-scarred’ backwoods, snacking on tins of spam and windfall fruit. Such is his need to identify with Greene that he includes a photograph of himself alongside one of the novelist (sweating under a solar topi) in Sierra Leone 80 years earlier.
Like many journalists, Butcher enjoys a sense of his own self-importance. (‘I can clearly remember receiving my first death threat,’ he tells us, grandly.) Most of the world’s recent ‘major conflicts’ have been reported by Butcher (so he tells us). During his 20-year stint on the Telegraph he used to commute to the newspaper’s London office by motorbike (as opposed to up the Thames by canoe), and clearly he thrilled to his duties. Reporting from hot spots abroad is not such a challenge, though, if you have few responsibilities at home: just put it on the plastic and leave the answer machine on. So come on, Mr Butcher!
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