About book Too Close To The Sun: The Audacious Life And Times Of Denys Finch Hatton (2007)
‘He had seen what men with imagination cannot help seeing in a dream country like Africa.’This biography is about Denys George Finch Hatton (24 April 1887 – 14 May 1931). Finch Hatton was one of the British settlers of East Africa early in the 20th century, was a big-game hunter, and also the lover of Karen Blixen (Isak Dinesen), who wrote about him in ‘Out of Africa’ (first published in 1937). And, while it’s the ‘Out of Africa’ connection which led me to read this book, it’s the history of these times in East Africa which kept me turning the pages. Denys Finch Hatton was, apparently, the kind of man that women adored and men idolized. He was an accomplished athlete whilst at Eton and Oxford but seemed to have little purpose in his life until he sailed to British East Africa in 1910 and fell in love with the continent. During his time in Africa, Finch Hatton saw action in the battlefields of the East Africa campaign where he was serving as a captain in the allied forces when he first met Karen Blixen in Nairobi.The facts of Finch Hatton’s life – his aristocratic heritage, his adventurous and restless spirit, and his affairs reflect aspects of a generation of Edwardian British settlers in East Africa. Not particularly likeable in many respects and from this distance, but certainly interesting. Ms Wheeler writes of Finch Hatton, of Blixen, and of some others, as pioneers in a land which was quickly becoming transformed as a consequence of struggles between European powers.Towards the end of his life, Finch Hatton was more interested in photographing animals than in shooting them. Perhaps, if he’d lived longer, he may have made an impact on conservation. Perhaps, given his restless spirit, he may have moved onto something completely different.'No one who ever met him,' his Times obituary concluded, 'whether man or woman, old or young, white or black, failed to come under his spell.'It’s hard to argue with a Times obituary, but the man those people met does not fully come to life for me on these pages. Denys Finch Hatton himself left few papers: no diaries, and only a few letters. I enjoyed this book, but less as a biography than as a history of colonial East Africa and of a period of British social history.Jennifer Cameron-Smith
"An eternal wanderer on a perpetual quest for knowledge and experience."Too Close to the Sun, The Audacious Life and Times of Denys Finch Hatton is as much a detailed history of British East Africa--the country known today as Kenya--as it is the story of Denys Finch Hatton's life. In other words, the focus is keener on the times than on the life.Finch Hatton, a notorious and romantic character portrayed in Out of Africa, the book of stories by Isak Dinesen (Karen Blixen) and the in the film played by Robert Redford, didn't keep a journal or, for that matter, write many letters. As a result, a great deal of the exhaustive research on him compiled by dedicated author, Sara Wheeler, is derived from Dinesen's fiction and other contemporary, Beryl Markham's autobiography, West With the Night. Generally well written, a bit on the formal side, the prose wavers between colorful and descriptive and textbook laborious. The subject, Finch Hatton, might have been better left to the material written by his former lovers than the subject of an entire biography.What I enjoyed most about this book was the trip to Kenya and the stunning visuals it provided. Having spent time there, including a visit to the town now known as "Karen," and a tour of Blixen's house, the pages of this book gave it a living history quality. Wheeler also clarifies Finch Hatton's character as more than the uncommitted lover of Karen Blixen ("Tania")--"They were living in different mental worlds, as unhappy lovers do, coexisting like the twin beaters of a rotary whisk, spinning in time by never touching"-- but also notes he was one of the first to point out the dangers of uncontrolled hunting on safari endangering Africa's wildlife. "For the first time in his life, he had found something he believed in, a cause that was worth commitment." Hence, his legacy as "an eternal wanderer on a perpetual quest for knowledge and experience," which is the main thrust of this dissertation.
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The was the life story of Denys Finch Hatton, of Out of Africa fame. I wasn't expecting to like this book as much as I did, but the writing was excellent and extremely evocative. Denys was the typical English nobleman who ended up living quite a non-conventional life. The fact that he really didn't get a focus/occupation until his late 30's/early 40's was a comforting one. The descriptions of Africa reminded me of my Dad's stories, and the white hunter that took him on his first trip in 1957 knew Denys and Karen Blixen and was mentioned in this well-researched and engrossing book.
—Benjamin
Mixed bag. The author's bit challenge is that there is very little historical record on Denys Finch Hatton, making it difficult to write a compelling biography. What succeeds well are the descriptions and background information on England and British East Africa / Kenya during Denys's time. Understandably not quite as successful are the descriptions of Denys himself. The writing is also occasionally disjointed. Particularly some of the footnotes, the author's own experiences, do not seem relevant to the story: while it is, perhaps, interesting that she "went off the map" in Antarctica, would argue that it does not fit the narrative - even when describing the contemporary aerial maps of Kenya with their uncharted territories. The abrupt ending, although probably intended to mirror the abrupt end of Denys's life, was a bit jarring. All told, it is an interesting read about both the time and the man - but there are also better versions of both.
—Laura
I had just come back from S. Africa when a friend of mine recommended this book. Not so much for the subject of the biography, Denys Finch Hatton, as for my interest in Africa and WWI. Hatton was Karen Blixen's lover and she wrote "Out of Africa."I was fascinated by the era, the events, and the country as told by Sara Wheeler, the author. Very little about the WWI campaign in East Africa has been written, and I knew little about the history of Kenya and Tanzania. "Too Close to the Sun" has it all, to say nothing of the characters who appear in the book.But best of all, is Wheeler's language and dry humour. She made me smell Africa in all its guises and made me laugh and cry. Recommended heartily.
—Julie Ferguson
