Officially about the hold the Sahara has over the western psyche, Sven Lindqvist’s short book continually evokes the starkness, harshness & loneliness experienced there. He also intertwines a memoir of his childhood & youth, remembered while he’s out in the sun-drenched wastel&, as well as examining the tragicomic aspects of colonialism. Lindqvist, who also wrote Exterminate All The Brutes, has lovingly written an impression of life in the Algerian & Moroccan s&-dunes, happily drawing on its consistent contradictions
- where there’s trading in both date fruits & oil, & where you’ll meet ancient, traditional Bedouins & hi-tech falconers. The desert divers of the title are the people that used to clean the deep wells, & he uses them in a fantastic metaphor for his efforts to bring to the surface the stories of colonial slaughter & exploitation that came before him
- & as a metaphor for his own examination of his childhood memories. superb.