Michelle Matthews The Africa House: The True Story of an English Gentleman and his African Dream by Christina Lamb (Penguin) Stewart Gore-Brown was an eccentric man. He built an arched and gargoyled country mansion, complete with rose gardens, in the middle of the Zambian bush. He let his servants, attired in neat pill-box hats and white gloves brought from England, drink port with his guests. He had revolutionary Kenneth Kaunda sleep in the best room at Shiwa House. Of course, Gore-Brown also beat his workers. Christina Lamb is sympathetic to the man: her voice and Gore-Brown’s merge to a point where the whole book takes on an irritating patriarchal tone, with Gore- Brown continually striving to do what’s best for the native. Lamb makes Shiwa House a metaphor for African colonialism. Here was an English gentleman who took civilisation to the wilds, who pumped resources into the estate, year after year, hardly ever making any profit. Lamb ends the book with various people remarking on how “sad” the now- dilapidated Shiwa is, this “dream gone sour”.
Stewart Gore-Brown was a complex man. It is not always clear what his motives were. The same cant be said for Lamb. The Africa House has sold exceptionally well, mostly to pseudo liberals who get all misty-eyed when they think of the good old daysOE Ill bet.