Down the Nile: Alone in a Fisherman's Skiff by Rosemary Mahoney
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Book Reviews of Down the Nile: Alone in a Fisherman's Skiff
Book Review: Amazing
Summary: 5 Stars
I read this book because I enjoyed another book, Whoredom in Kimmage, by the same author. This one, though very different, is every bit as excellent. I have done business in several developing countries, including Egypt, and I found Mahoney extremely well informed. Her descriptions are surprisingly on the mark for a person who only spent a total of three months in the country. The book is full of history, detail, and fascinating information about the Egyptians and their culture. The writing is beautiful. It's also very colorful and funny. But for me, the most moving part of the book is the story that lies at its heart: the tender and mutually respectful friendship the author finds with a Nubian man who accepted her desire to row on the river and helped her realize it. The story is just beautiful. Mahoney's affection and interest for him--and his for her-- is a model for the way we all should treat people from other cultures.
Mahoney makes no pretensions to being an Egypt expert, just a curious traveller. She also doesn't pretend to have had a "grand" adventure. She makes it clear that the part of the Nile she wanted to row was just a fraction of that river. She prepared carefully for her trip and followed it through with guts, persistence, and patience. The book is obviously not about rowing but about all the things that happened on her way to fulfilling a dream and the lessons she learned, which is what it makes it so human and interesting. She finds Egypt beautiful, complex, and compelling and describes it in a vivid and intelligent style.
Mahoney went all over Egypt alone, striking up conversations with strangers, visiting their houses with curiosity, openness, and an attitude of acceptance that is rare. She was sensitive and thoughtful and talked with nearly every person she met, many of whom were men who followed her down the street drilling her with intimate questions, telling her that all foreign women are prostitutes, and making lewd comments. This a common occurrence in Luxor and Aswan. But Mahoney is very perceptive, even-handed, and forgiving about it. Just read this passage about a felucca captain who tricked and mocked her:
"Hussein . . . had tricked me, I knew, as much in bitterness as in fun. More than one felucca captain in Egypt resented the foreigners they served. It was understandable: they earned a marginal living facilitating the leisure of privileged individuals who came to bask in the exotic scenery and mysterious history of Aswan; people who stayed in five-star hotels that the languishing locals in their dusty flip-flops were not allowed to enter; people, pale and plump, who had enough money to bask in a false superiority yet haggled ferociously over pennies with their malnourished hosts . . . the condescension Hussein showed me was likely an echo of the condescension he received."
I could quote many passages like this one.
I read a lot of travel literature. The best travel books are always comprehensive, colorful, and balanced. I'm sure you won't find a more intelligent, informative, self-aware, or sympathetic travel narrative about Egypt than this one.
Book Review: Highly Recommended
Summary: 5 Stars
Rosemary Mahoney has a rare sense of clear-eyed wonder that -- combined with great writing -- makes this book a rare delight.
As someone who has lived in the Middle East, I found her descriptions realistic, honest and always engaging. I wanted to pull out an especially great passage as an example and I ended up feeling like a kid in a toy store -- this one, no, this one. There is rarely a word that doesn't hit the mark, a description that doesn't ring with wonder. This is travel writing at its best.
I won't give you the basic plotline; I'm sure that's in a dozen other reviews. I will just leave you with this excerpt from the book: "Aswan's desert air seems to caress the town with warm promise, lending vividness and meaning to manifestions of poverty and and human struggle that would elsewhere be considered ugly. The piles of garbage, the heaps of smoldering ashes, the scatterings of broken glass, the architectural rubble, the human excrement, the sun-bleached plastic shopping bags and rusted tin cans that seem to ring all Egyptian villages and besmirch every empty plane between them are, in Aswan, softened by the sheer volume of sun and water, color and air. Here, fishermens's houses cobbled together out of mud bricks and rusted tin cans appear somehow more ingenious than slovenly, more fascinating than dispiriting."
Book Review: Loved it!
Summary: 5 Stars
I read Mahoney's book before my trip to Egypt and again upon returning to the U.S. It was great to have seen the places she writes about; Abu Simbel, Aswan, Elephantine Island, etc. And the way she writes about the people she encounters is endearing. I've also read "A Likely Story" and look forward to enjoying more of her tales.Book Review: What A Brave Lady!
Summary: 5 Stars
I recently returned from a tour of Egypt and a 5 day cruise down the Nile, and I've got to say that Ms. Mahoney has written one great story about this charming and mysterious country. Myself being a single woman and traveling alone in this strange land, I must say that this author is spot on with her descriptions and characterizations of everything Egyptian and there aren't enough words to say how much I enjoyed this book.
I highly recommend this book to anyone planning a trip to Egypt, especially single women traveling alone.
Book Review: A beautiful and thoughtful book.
Summary: 5 Stars
What a beautiful and thoughtful book. Rosemary Mahoney sees and describes clearly using unique combinations of words that illuminate an alien landscape and culture. A literate voice with an honest eye.
I enjoyed the adventures she shared with us and admire the courage she showed in undertaking them.