The Last Savanna: A Writer’s Memory

The savanna lies deep in our subconscious. From years ago when we hunted naked for our food, and the savanna was the only world we knew. Vast plains goldened under the sun, copses and ridges of forest, a stream down the middle of a lovely valley. Plains so wide that mountains seventy miles away seem next to us. The world of our ancestors, where our DNA was honed.

Our first homeland.

And the last of it’s going fast, as are the elephants who once lived here, and most of the other great beasts, and the remnants of Africa’s ancient forests.

The villains in this tragedy are clear:

• Overpopulation, so that demand for everything increases exponentially. There are simply too many people on this poor little earth, and if we don’t solve it, mother nature will.
• The single greatest villain is China. It is clearcutting Africa’s ancient forests, destroying its ocean fisheries, and killing the last elephants.
• World trade agreements that encourage the destruction of nature in the name of “sustainable development”, where bankers grow richer and local folks get pauperized.

Thus the ancient question: what do we do? We all fight hard, sometimes every day, to protect this world we love. But that isn’t enough. We’re still losing this world, faster and faster.

All we can do is continue to give each other fortitude and courage, to select our battles, fight hard and save what we can.

Because of China’s central role in the extermination of elephants, I refuse to buy Chinese products whenever I possibly can. Every dollar paid for a Chinese product can help to kill another elephant. There are many similar consumer choices we can make, and that make a difference.

I wrote THE LAST SAVANNA because the loss of Africa, the loss of the magic savanna, was driving me crazy. It still does. If I can just, I thought, pass on to the reader exactly what it’s like to live deeply on the savanna, in the desert heat, at risk of death. To hunt down the elephant poachers, to go crazy trying to save the woman you love. To save the earth you love.

To sink you so deeply into the tale that it becomes yours.