Karen Blixen - Isak Dinesen home

Question 64: Info about "Ex Africa"?

Q. I do not succeed in finding Karen Blixen's poem "Ex Africa." Can you tell me something about it?

A. The poem has been published in Danish in: Osceola. Karen Blixen. Copenhagen: Gyldendal, 1962.

In "Ex Africa" Karen Blixen describes a visit to the Uaso Nyiro ("brown river") on a hunting trip. Bror took her there in June 1914, after she had had a long bout with malaria. The river is found in what is now Samburu National Park, in the direction of Mt. Kenya, 200 kilometers north of Nairobi. She mentions places along the route: Mt. Suswa, an extinct volcano in the Rift Valley; Kijabe, a village that looks down over the Rift; and the Kedong valley. She also mentions the Ngong Hills, which form the eastern edge of the Rift Valley near Nairobi.

The poem was written in Danish. Karen Blixen was not fluent in English at the time the poem was written (1915).

The poem may have been written shortly after Karen Blixen emerged from a long stay in the hospital (with syphilis). She says at the outset that she is getting to know the moon "again."

She mentions street lights--evidently the street lights in Denmark--under the moon.

She addresses the moon, wondering if it is looking down on the "Guaso Nyeri" river she remembers.

She doesn't mention Bror, but she does mention Farah (her gun bearer) and Ismail (her cook).

She describes coming back from hunting, sitting down beside the campfire, watching Sabagathi, sweating,  bringing in more firewood. Farah takes her gun and brings her a glass of wine. She relaxes, watching the sparks rise from the fire. The stars come out, and, as he puts the game on the spit, Ismail tells stories of "hunting and love" from long ago.

Karen Blixen switches from the past tense to the present tense as she describes the sounds of insects wailing like a song and multitudes of animals moving about in the darkness. The sound of lions roaring is unforgettable and chills her blood. She says that all these multitudes were left undisturbed in the night until the coming of the "whites."

She describes stars falling like tears over cheeks. The lions sense the coming of light. They glance toward the east and reluctantly move away from their feeding on carcasses. Dawn brings with it heavy dew, illuminating hill and dale, as zebra graze all around like white specks against the grass. Girls in the Masai manyatta open the wattle gates of the enclosure, and the bleating sheep and lowing cattle move down to the smooth river's edge to drink.

The sun comes up, drying the spoor of the cattle. By noon there is a scent of sulphur in the air and a feeling of dizziness from the heat. Blue mountains emerge on the horizon, and below them, over the plains, you can see lightning. The lightning flashes like spears. "Look!" says Karen Blixen. The lightning is the Masai on the move, always wandering.

Copyright © 2003 by Linda Donelson. All rights reserved.