BETWEEN MAN and BEAST

Is this a non fiction book that reads like fiction? Yes and no. There was plenty of history, but it could have been presented with a little more panache. If you have read my reviews, you know that this style of writing is my favorite genre...but don’t do it half way. I liked this book, however it could have been written in a way that would have resulted in many nail-biting chapter endings. Monte Reel, you were so close to perfection! You have a 5’ 3’’ unknown explorer who had the guts to stand up to a furious gorilla charge as your main character. According to your own research, the first white man to encounter this highly debatable relative of man is Paul Du Chaillu. You wrote an interesting tale, but you had the wherewithal at your fingertips to tell it in a more intoxicating style. This explorer, Paul Du Chaillu, in 2013 is practically incognito. Nobody in the mid to late 1800s understood who he was, just imagine what today’s students know about Du Chaillu. Nothing! I see a book that could have been written with more flare and page turning capabilities. Okay, enough said, it was still a reasonable success.

This is the story of Paul Du Chaillu of dubious parentage being brought up by the missionaries' John and Jane Wilson in Gabon, West Africa. Eventually, Wilson gets Du Chaillu a job as a French teacher in Carmel, NY. Once in America, Du Chaillu’s African stories get to John Cassin, head of Philadelphia’s Academy of Natural Sciences. Paul earns a paid expedition back to Africa to find and send back specimens of unknown animals and birds. He sends back many stuffed specimens over the next three years, but becomes famous for being the first white man to encounter a gorilla. Once back in America, Paul finds that there is little interest in his findings, and The Academy of Natural Sciences refuses to reimburse his expedition expenses. When Paul tries to display his gorilla skins in NYC, he is out maneuvered by P.T. Barnum’s Broadway museum. Monte Reel’s prose had this reviewer rooting hard for this would be explorer with no credentials.

During this time period, Charles Darwin’s On the Origin of Species is published in England, sparking debates pro and con. Suddenly Paul’s encounter with gorillas becomes meaningful. Richard Owen, superintendent of all the natural history collections at the British Museum, invites Paul to England to " show and tell " his African expedition experiences. Guess what? England loves him! Since Paul isn’t a “educated” explorer, he has his backers and attackers. Stories are written about him by the great Charles Dickens and William Makepeace Thackeray in their respective magazines. All is good! Not. Here comes the attack on his story and qualifications by England’s zoological society’s head, John Gray, and a jealous retired explorer, Charles Waterton. Ladies and gentleman, let the gorilla wars begin! This is where the novel gets intriguing and the ensuing chapters magnetic.

I haven’t read Reel’s first book, The Last of the Tribe , but I have to say that Monte Reel has the knack for writing novels about uncommon subjects that are irreproachably researched. My only criticism is his occasional lack of verve. If you don’t know what I mean, read Robert Klara’s FDR's Funeral Train , Candice Millard’s Destiny of the Republic , or Erik Larson’s The Devil in the White City . Nonetheless, I thoroughly enjoyed this book, and profoundly endorse Monte Reel’s latest book.

RATING: 4 out of 5 stars

Comment: It has been said that the 1933 film King Kong , created by Merian C. Cooper was inspired by Paul Chaillu’s adventures in Africa. According to Wikipedia: “ Cooper's fascination with gorillas began with his boyhood reading of Paul Du Chaillu's Explorations and Adventures in Equatorial Africa (1861) and was furthered in 1929 by studying a tribe of baboons in Africa while filming The Four Feathers. Paul’s influence in books and movies is quite incredible. Darwin’s theories seem to be alive in this movie also: “Merian C. Cooper wanted King Kong to be more of an ape, but Willis O'Brien wanted King Kong to be more of a human being. A compromise was met with King Kong being made into an apeman.”

In 1949, the movie Mighty Joe Young also had the flavor of Paul Du Chaillu’s adventures: “In Africa, the girl Jill Young trades a baby gorilla with two natives and raises the animal. Twelve years later, the talkative and persuasive promoter Max O'Hara organizes a safari to Africa with the Oklahoma cowboy Gregg to bring attractions to his new night-club in Hollywood.” The oddity here is that the actor, Robert Armstrong, plays a similar showman in both movies: Carl Denham in King Kong and Max O’hara in Mighty Joe Young. Armstrong played a similar part for a third time in Son of Kong ( 1933 )

White Pongo ( a 1945 film ) relates to some of Monte Reel’s storyline: “Hunters and scientists venture into the jungle to track down a savage albino gorilla, which they believe could be the missing link between man and ape." Sounds like the title of Reel’s book, doesn’t it? This 1856 expedition to Africa has had a lasting impression on Hollywood, even though the average human has never heard of Paul Du Chaillu.

Finally, as a sidebar to Monte’s book, here is what some tribes in Africa thought about America’s slave trade: “One of them confessed to Paul that his tribe had heard stories about the fiercely cannibalistic ways of white men. Paul's first instinct was to laugh him off as a simple minded fool. But the legend hadn't been conjured from thin air. When Paul tried to assure him that white men didn't eat black men, the man confronted him with a direct challenge: explain why they bought and sold Africans as if they were cattle, not human beings."Why do you come from nobody knows where, and carry off our men, and women, and children?" the man asked Paul. "Do you not fatten them in your far country and eat them?”