Remote People by Evelyn Waugh

Perhaps the funniest travel book ever written, Remote People begins with a vivid account of the coronation of Emperor Ras Tafari – Haile Selassie I, King of Kings – an event covered by Evelyn Waugh in 1930 as special correspondent for The Times.

It continues with subsequent travels throughout Africa, where natives rub shoulders with eccentric expatriates, settlers with Arab traders and dignitaries with monks. Interspersing these colourful tales are three ‘nightmares’ which describe the vexations of travel, including returning home.

Remote People describes Evelyn Waugh’s travels in Ethiopia, Aden, Zanzibar, Kenya, Uganda and finally the Congo. I was looking forward to reading it – Ethiopia is a permanent fixture on my travel list and my travels around East Africa have shown me (in my opinion) some of the most extraordinary scenery and wildlife in the world. I finished the book with mixed feelings.

On the positive side, I like Waugh’s writing style and I envied the unhurried approach to travel in the 1930s. Without the abundance of commercial airlines we have now, it seems that travellers of that era had to stick around in a place until a train or boat departed. Occasionally Waugh was forced to travel to a place he had not planned to visit, simply due to the limited transport options. This is a double-edged sword – it must have been frustrating to have your options restricted in this way but, on the other hand, I liked the idea of unexpectedly discovering a new place (assuming you have the time, of course).

In the earlier parts of the book, Waugh describes some trips around the area where he was staying at the time, including a multi-day trip into the Ethiopian mountains and a notable hike in Aden. However, his experiences as a whole were heavily centred around the ‘sanctuary’ of the British Empire. Almost everywhere he went, he visited golf clubs, stayed in hotels run by Europeans and even ran into people he had known at school. It seemed very strange to me for a Brit to visit East Africa and socialise in the same circles as he would in London. Despite his excursions in Ethiopia and Aden, I did not feel that he had made the most of Kenya, Uganda or Zanzibar. In fact, he was particularly critical about Zanzibar and did not once mention its splendid white sand beaches and turquoise sea. (I hesitate to contradict his descriptions of the Congo. From what I have read about modern-day DRC, I have the sense that Waugh’s comments on the Belgian Congo’s infrastructure would be largely unchanged today. DRC is sadly war-torn and notoriously unsafe.)

Waugh’s travels are interspersed with some travel ‘nightmares’, mainly involving difficulties travelling from place to place due to unreliable transport. His descriptions of the locals’ relaxed attitude to unfixed train timetables and late-departing boats felt a bit more relatable and authentic to me – we’ve all been in that position and I have at times found this stressful. That said, Waugh’s writing style does not indicate that he ever felt out of his depth at any point on his travels, suggesting that he was capable of handling anything that was thrown at him, but I would query the truth of this given how reticent he seemed about embracing the local culture.

On that subject, I couldn’t initially gauge Waugh’s real thoughts on Africa in the context of imperialism. In some passages of the book, he gives the impression that he was willing to deviate from the beaten track (and indeed does so) and that he was almost always courteous to the people he met, acknowledging the occasions he was not. On the other hand, I got an increasing sense of superiority from Waugh as the book progressed. From what I have read about him, he became steadily more conservative and resistant to modernisation throughout his life. Remote People was published in 1934 when he was just 31 so, although his views may not yet have solidified by then, I did distinctly detect the beginnings of that conservativeness in Remote People, particularly in his loyalty to Britain and the Empire.

If I were being entirely fair to Waugh, I would make two points in his defence. First, my judgment that he did not make the most of his time in Africa possibly comes from the fact that Remote People contains relatively little description of the African scenery. My own travel priorities are scenery and wildlife, so I was focused on those aspects, but perhaps Waugh was more interested in the people, hence the title of the book. Everyone travels differently. Secondly, it is not out of the question that sticking to European familiarities might have been the normal way for a Brit to travel in the era of the British Empire. I wouldn’t do it myself but I haven’t read enough travel memoirs to comment.

I think the fairest verdict on this book is that it is a product of its time.