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Captain Sir Richard Francis Burton: The Secret Agent Who Made the Pilgrimage to Mecca, Discovered the Kama Sutra and Brought the Arabian Nights to the West

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A New York Times best-seller when it was first published, Rice's biography is the gripping story of a fierce, magnetic, and brilliant man whose real-life accomplishments are the stuff of legend.

Rice retraces Burton's steps as the first European adventurer to search for the source of the Nile; to enter, disguised, the forbidden cities of Mecca and Medina; and to travel through remote stretches of India, the Near East, and Africa. From his spying exploits to his startling literary accomplishments (the discovery and translation of the Kama Sutra and his seventeen-volume translation of Arabian Nights), Burton was an engrossing, larger-than-life Victorian figure, and Rice's splendid biography lays open a portrayal as dramatic, complicated, and compelling as the man himself.

688 pages, Paperback

First published May 14, 1990

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Edward Rice

41 books10 followers

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Displaying 1 - 30 of 116 reviews
Profile Image for Christopher.
252 reviews61 followers
May 23, 2016
Ah, the great and indomitable Captain Sir Richard Francis Burton, how long my hero! I remember not when I first heard of this amazing man, probably during one of my philological phases during which I became obsessed with past hyperpolyglots, of whom Burton is by far the most impressive though not for his language skills so much as for his life in general.

Throughout my teen years I started reading his works on many occasions, though having so active a mind at that time that I could scarcely get through a page without some statement catching my eye and feeling strongly inclined to investigate further. Such is the problem of growing up in the age of the internet! However, now that I have become reacquainted with my fondest childhood hero I suppose that I shall have to return to at least his two-volume Pilgrimage.

I have three complaints which almost led me to give this a 4-star, but in the end my adoration for this most amazing of men won out: the first complaint being that the book is poorly sourced. While a fair bibliography is appended, and each chapter is given a list of sources upon which it was based, my obsession with cross-referencing and exploring further causes me to frown upon the lack of references for each statement of fact.

The second complaint is that the book is just so damned short! I have a biography of T.E. Lawrence which I intend soon on conquering, all ca. 1000 pages thereof; however, for a man who lived a relatively short life (around 45 years, as I recall), though I am sure he fit many impressive events therein (I'm sure I'll discover soon the verity of that thought), 1000 pages seems like a great deal; and here is the magnificent Sir Richard Francis Burton given only 619, and with larger print and thus fewer words per page than that of Lawrence! I would just as happily (though, in all honestly, probably with some reservation) have read a 2,500 page work on Burton, and I feel convinced that such is a possibility without becoming too drawn out. Or perhaps I am simply to enamored of the man?

My third complaint is the author: He seems - though having not read anything by Burton in years, and only reading bits and pieces at that, I cannot say for certain - to have made a number of assumptions which seem to me to be pure conjecture, such as that Burton was a Muslim and stating that, while his wife thought he was saying Catholic prayers while locked away in a room while in, as I recall, Trieste, he may very well have been performing salat. Were he a Muslim I would probably find him all the more fascinating, but I am left with the distinct impression that he, like myself (perhaps because of those last two words), had a profound fascination in religion and, more specifically, in human culture and nature, while less of a dogmatic belief. How else could he have engaged in so many diverse religious ceremonies and rituals?

Regardless of these shortcomings, this book has rekindled within my Will the desire to return to my childhood fascination with Victorian adventurers and study in greater depth than ever the Great Game, the Scramble for Africa, and all the actors thereof. Surely this was a great starting place, for every chapter names plenty of contemporaries and predecessors of Burton who embarked on similar daring missions into the Unknown.

Ultimately, this is a book which, though probably very difficult to find (I haunt my local used book stores and always am sure to obtain whatever such books on these, my favorite, themes which appear), it is still one which I would recommend to all, for who does not enjoy the pinnacle of Romance and adventure, of daring courage and audacious treks into terra incognita?
Profile Image for Theo Logos.
1,193 reviews238 followers
June 16, 2022
Soldier, spy, swordsman, linguist, proto-anthropologist, adventurer, explorer, eroticist, prolific writer and poet, and gnosis seeker - Richard Francis Burton was all of this and more. While no single biography can capture the entirety of this amazing life, Edward Rice's book is an insightful, fascinating treatment of this larger than life man.

While Rice's book covers the whole of Burton's life and career, its concentration and strengths are on his period of greatest adventuring and exploring, from his introduction to India and the East as a soldier and spy for the East India Company, through his exploits in Arabia, and his explorations in Africa. Rice lingers long over Burton's wanderings in India, exploring in depth how Burton immersed himself in Eastern languages, customs, religions, and thought until he could easily pass himself off as a native. Burton's most famous exploits - the pilgrimage to Mecca disguised as an Arab, penetrating the sacred and forbidden city of Harar in East Africa (the first European to do so), and his explorations of Central Africa, searching for the source of the Nile, are all covered in depth, with great detail.

Rice takes the time to concentrate on two of the more shadowy aspects of Burton's life - his participation in the "Great Game"; spying for the British Empire, and his personal search after Gnosis, the hidden wisdom of life. Often these pursuits were intertwined, as when his initiations into secret Hindu and Sufi sects served both to further his personal quest for gnosis, and to give him cover and openings for his espionage activities.

Also well covered are Burton's greatest literary achievements His superb annotated translation of the Arabian Nights (for which he was knighted), his translation of The Perfumed Garden, and his original Sufi poem, The Kasidah, are given particular attention, but much of his prolific literary production is also noted.

This book has its weaknesses, but they are slight. It starts out rather slowly, as Rice give outstanding background information on the British Empire in India, which while valuable, momentarily distracts the story away from Burton's amazing life. Also, it seems that Rice so admired his subject that he could not bear to show him in any but the best light. In every major controversy of Burton's career, Rice always favors Burton's side, almost to the point of occasionally glossing over some of Burton's very real flaws.

This book is a valuable addition to the Burton literature, and should be required reading for any Burton enthusiasts, or anyone who is a fan of remarkable lives of adventure.
Profile Image for Erik Graff.
5,145 reviews1,391 followers
February 4, 2013
I first learned of Richard Francis Burton by my disappointing reading of the copy of the Kama Sutra hidden away by my parents, then by discovering him to be among the first translators of a number of other exotic travel books and erotic classics (still unread--the Sutra had burned me!) as well as a major figure in the "discovery" of the sources of the Nile as portrayed in a docudrama on National Educational Television and in Alan Moorehead's two books on the subject. What an interesting fellow he must have been, particularly considering that he lived his entire life in the nineteenth century.

Rice's biography and Burton's life are not disappointing--not at all. Apparently there is a vast literature about Burton and apparently Rice was on top of it all when he essayed another account. The book was fun, a real pleasure to read, even educational for one who knows little about the lands touched, often roughly, by English colonisation and exploration during the period.

A note: Burton's wife, his English wife, was quite a considerable character in her own right. Rice gives her such attention that one hopes for another biography.
Profile Image for GoldGato.
1,272 reviews38 followers
November 19, 2013
Sir Richard Francis Burton was extraordinary, one of those polymath Victorians who explored the world while writing poetry and speaking multiple languages. This is the best biography I have read about the great man and his travels. The author actually travelled to the sites of Burton's life, which gives the reader a closeup view of Burton's exotic nature.

Sir Richard crossed the Somali desert, was the first European to reach Lake Tanganyika, wrote a comprehensive book on swordsmanship, lived in a brothel while studying mysticism, translated the ARABIAN NIGHTS, and visited the forbidden city of Mecca (in disguise). A rather full life.

Book Season = Winter
Profile Image for Ana.
816 reviews51 followers
June 11, 2014
Isabel Burton, I shall never forgive you.
Profile Image for Mike.
1,220 reviews170 followers
February 21, 2016
What an amazing man! He brings the mysticism of the East to light for the western reader. The tales of his study of Islam and, especially, Sufi mysticism form a large part of the early story. Does Burton convert to Islam? Seems so and he eventually makes the haj to Mecca and Medina. He flows through so many cultures, fluently speaking the language (29 different languages in the end). The book did not give me enough on his early missions around the Sind and Persia, where he could pass as a native or, at least, not recognized as an Englishman.

Burton leaves India for Africa just months before the 1857 Sepoy Rebellion. The account of his East African exploration in search of the Nile River’s source is very tough reading. He traveled with John Hanning Speke and this was not a happy partnership. How these men pushed on through the most terrible environments and illnesses is remarkable. Speke eventually is given credit for finding the Nile source but comes across as a very despicable person in this book.

Burton travels to America and explores the South and West in 1860, just missing the Civil War. He meets Brigham Young and spends time in Utah. Then he travels to San Francisco and winds his way back to England.

He was an “amateur barbarian”, never sitting in the safe forts but out among the natives, exploring and learning (his favorite language teachers were prostitutes). He liked the exotic women of the East, and Africa, and South America and everywhere. His accounts of sexual practices abound (although much was destroyed by his widow). He didn’t marry until he was 40. It seemed he was admiring of certain cultures mores:



He spent the last 18 years of his life as British Consul in Trieste, where he set up 11 different tables in a huge room translating “The Arabian Nights” from Persian, Arabic, Hindustani and other languages. He also wrote many other books at the same time.



The book ends on a sad note. Much of his work is destroyed by his widow. After she dies, more is destroyed by another woman relation. The book makes clear what an irreplaceable loss this was.
Overall, the book was good and gets better in the last third. It did not have as much “Burton” as I wanted, Rice writes his own words rather than let Burton come alive on the pages through quotes and excerpts. 4 Stars
Profile Image for DeAnna Knippling.
Author 172 books278 followers
August 24, 2017
Excellent. A complex man, full of bloody-minded paradoxes, high aspirations, and stupid mistakes, restless as hell, bigoted, amazing, and flawed. A meaty biography.
Profile Image for George.
87 reviews12 followers
August 27, 2007
One of the most unique figures of the 19th century. If anyone from that era might qualify as a renaissance man surely it would be this man. The very model of the 19th century explorer, but not only an explorer of the globe but of the human experience. A soldier in India, traveler across the Middle East, explorer in Somalia and Central Africa and diplomat,translator, author, poet, probably the most noted linguist of his time. There doesn't appear to be any area of human existence that didn't fascinate and intrigue him. While he was often lionized in Victorian England, his interests extended into human sexuality as it was practiced in the various lands he traveled, and scandalized many of his contemporiaries, and most especially his wife, who spent a significant portion of the time immediately following his death burning as much of his writings as she could get her hands on. This book is as close to being the definitive work of his life as anything ever written, including all his various flaws and pecularities.
193 reviews1 follower
September 27, 2023
In my two-prong review I shall say a few words on the man himself and then on the book.

First hand there is something utterly annoying about Burton, his never-ending womanizing and whoring. Let's face it: he was a heck of a horndog. His ethnological research abroad must have come as a good excuse for his wallowing in erotica and reproductive anatomy. For he spared his reader nothing about male and female - mostly female actually - privates, circumcision, excision and infibulation, part and parcel. I almost picture him sitting at his desk in the poor light of a flickering candle at dead of night, one hand putting pen to paper, the other getting itself real busy over his crotch!
Another jarring idiosyncracy of his is his writing about himself in the third person. Did he think he was Julius Cesar or what?!

Now that said, as for all the rest, what an astonishing trailblazer he was! A man with so many specialisms, so well ahead of his Victorian time, so broadminded!
I can't think of any better tribute to him than The Atlantic's, which you can find in the blurb actually: "[...] Any novelist who invented a character like Burton would be accused of piling the impossible on the improbable, yet the man really lived."
Burton's was a most fascinating life indeed!

Edward Rice comes up with a compelling and comprehensive biography, very impressive. Yet I found it hard to take to it. While reading I kept on wondering why and in the end I guess it must be that there is so much to say about Burton, still there are only so many pages you can write in one book. As a result Rice sometimes can't but yield to skimming and Burton the undercover agent did not help with the many shades of grey he had left behind.

Burton's contribution to our better understanding of Asian and Arab culture, as well as Islam and Hinduism, is very significant. So is his commitment to making his contemporaries change their minds about many things, amongst which slavery and female sexuality at a time when prudishness and uptightness and machoism and racism were run-of-the-mill misconceptions. So it tends to bear out the idea that you can be both a compulsive philanderer and an avant-garde feminist. That makes much grist for the mill of our Me-too era. And just for that I am not entirely dissatisfied with this read.
Profile Image for Eric Norris.
37 reviews9 followers
June 30, 2015
A comprehensive introduction to one of the most fascinating figures of the Victorian age. Spy, explorer, linguist, soldier, sensualist, husband, translator of the Arabian Nights and Kama Sutra, serious drinker and Sufi Muslim convert (?), the list of Richard Francis Burton's accomplishments is too long to be summarized in any review, or any biography, even a hefty volume like this, of 619 pages. The pacing of the book is good, it almost reads like an adventure story by H. Rider Haggard. In fact, putting the book down, one can hardly believe a man like Burton lived outside the pages of fiction. Still, I felt something was missing in this portrait that I couldn't quite place my finger on. I didn't get a good feeling for the real Burton: the man beneath the scars—the results not only of tropical disease and hard fought hand-to-hand battles, but also self-inflicted injuries incurred during religious ecstasies. The biographer tells us that Burton sought in the cultures he encountered a kind of "Gnosis", or "Knowing", mystic knowledge he clearly could not find in Europe. What kind of vacuum, or void, did Burton sense in his soul? In Europe's? How might this be psychologically related—for good and ill—to his exertions and the idea of Empire and his place within it? I am filled with unanswered questions. Not a bad thing, per se, stimulated curiosity. Perhaps over-stimulated, in this case. Anyway, something about Burton's interior life and the age in which he lived eluded this biographer’s pen, in my opinion. Something that might only be visible to a lover or a painter. Hence, my three dubious stars. Like you, I am an amateur reader of souls and I am in no position to refuse anyone the benefit of the doubt.
6 reviews
December 4, 2007
This is the man who really did the things only fantasized about in books like King Solomons Mines and Indiana Jones. This man was alleged to be the first non Moslem white westerner to go to Mecca. He spoke dozens of languages (many learned from extensive study in brothels, knew the Koran better than many learned scholars and functioned as a sort of advance man for British government and corporate interests in Africa in the nineteenth century.
He was substantially disliked by those who needed his skills most because he had the gall to respect the "exotic" cultures and peoples he experienced in India and Africa and the Middle East. The British don't have a reputation for that. He was the one to translate and publish The Arabian Nights and The Kama Sutra in English. He wanted to prick a pin in the overinflated stuffy arrogance of the Victoria British and he succeeded remarkably well.
They don't seem to make men like this anymore. He was with out a doubt a man larger than life, with boundless energy and intelligence and subtle sophistication that put him a century or more ahead of his time. This is one of the best books I have read in the way it opened up my understanding about the issues he was instrumental in affecting. This is a very readable and entertaining book unlike anything else I can think of in non fiction because of the subject. I am still reveling in the pleasure I got from reading it and may reread it again. I only loan it to those I can trust to return it promptly.
Profile Image for Daniel Frank.
308 reviews54 followers
June 17, 2021
I was born with a love for adventure. While the passion to explore the next frontier always burns within me, sometimes the candle burns a little bit dimmer. Reading books like this adds fuel to the fire and inspires me to be excited for the next great journey, whenever and whatever capacity that may be in.

Read about the intrepid Richard Burton and see if his life story resonates with you; if you, you may want to consider reading this - or any of the other amazing tales of exploration out there.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard...
175 reviews
June 12, 2015
A thorough, at times overtly sympathetic, biography of Captain Richard Sir Francis Burton that goes beyond chronicling Burton's incredible life and delves into his psyche. Burton was an incredible linguist and explorer of the Middle East, Africa, and parts of North and South America. The kind of guy who got a spear through the face and kept on going. His wife Isabel was a real piece of work, and she is treated in some detail in the book as well. While the book is sympathetic to Burton in his interpersonal relationships (e.g., his battles with Speke), it doesn't gloss over his depression, struggle for financial security, and eccentricities. A very interesting read.
3 reviews
January 7, 2021
The best biography I've ever read. Ed Rice did a great work researching such an incredible personality for such an incredible book. The work ranges from Burton's intimacy(psychological, sexual, religious) to his feats in a macro scale, that is, how he is seen by those that don't consider themselves "Burtonians". Great pick for anyone interested in such an interesting man.
1 review
December 23, 2008
Long and detailed but well written story of one fascinating person
3 reviews
January 24, 2009
Informative but with no narrative drive that this real life adventurer deserves.
Profile Image for ThereWillBeBooks.
82 reviews13 followers
August 13, 2020
When Richard Burton was stationed in India he began to study monkeys in earnest. He collected them, observed them, and assigned them all a rank and title, assembling his own little simian squad. Burton was an absurdly gifted linguist and was able to “collect” sixty words from the monkeys “before losing interest.” Sadly the notes from this monkey business were lost in a warehouse fire.

When Burton was stationed in Egypt he and the other British officers would taunt the local alligators, luring them into water with raw chicken on a string, and then they would attempt to ride the alligators “like a bull” across the river.

Burton was one of the first Westerners to make the pilgrimage to Mecca (disguised as a Persian believer and fluent enough in Farsi and Arabic to pull it off), and was one of the first Europeans to happen upon Lake Tanganyika. He was a Sufi mystic who married an observant Catholic whom he had a deep connection with and who burned a good deal of his papers upon his death (they were very risque and inappropriate for the times). He spoke twenty-some-odd languages and was a translator of The Arabian Nights and The Kama Sutra.

I don’t know, some people just live a full life.
Profile Image for Erik Rostad.
416 reviews159 followers
May 21, 2022
What a life! Spy, author, linguist, world traveler, just to name a few.
Profile Image for Bill.
94 reviews8 followers
Read
August 3, 2011
There is perhaps no finer subject for a biography than THE Richard Burton (no, not the actor). Richard Francis Burton spoke 39 languages, was the first westerner to report firsthand on the Kabba (the Cube), the object of every Haji's pilgrimage to Mecca, which he made surreptitiously in full Arab costume and appearance, speaking flawless Arabic. He would have been killed had his cover been blown - there isn't much that has changed in that part of the world's hostility to Westerners since 1851... He also discovered, with William Speke, the source of the Nile river; translated the Heptameron, the Kama Sutra, and the Thousands Nights and a Night (his is considered the finest translation) and many other works from a variety of languages.

This biography has an story-teller's sense of timing and narrative and is far superior to an earlier work "The Devil Drives", which is full of psychobabble.

The 19th century didn't know what to make of Burton, and the 20th century had no such adventures available to a type like his. He helped make the world small.

Check out the movie "Mountains of the Moon" if you want to see an excellent film that dramatizes the search for the Nile and a bit of Burton's other travels (e.g. through cannibalistic Somaliland -current day Somalia).
Profile Image for Kevin Farrell.
374 reviews6 followers
June 2, 2011
This is an amazing book about an amazing man who was a soldier for the East India Tea Company during the height of British colonialism. Burton was a natural linguist who would master local languages wherever he landed. As you read this you will be shocked and appalled at times by how he lived and how he learned languages in many different locations throughout Arab and African countries. He was confident enough to be able to travel as an Arab or a Hindu - as the circumstances required.

Burton was a spy before there was a word for it. He was extremely intelligent and wanted to be a great explorer of the world. In his lifetime he was never given the recognition that he deserved because he was not of noble birth in England. During his professional life he was always being upstaged by someone whose family ties were more powerful than his own and it devastated him.
Profile Image for Nick Wallace.
258 reviews2 followers
June 24, 2009
What a badass! A man who spent years traveling among and studying the various peoples of north India, the Middle East, and central Africa when most British people spent much of their time abroad among other Britons (generally, I guess not much has changed). A master of twenty-nine languages (something like twelve by the age of 24), a keen ethnologist, and an extremely bawdy guy (if you ever read an unexpurgated version of the Arabian Nights, it was most likely his translation). The only reason for the absence of a five-star rating is that he lived long enough to become bitter and waste away.
Profile Image for John.
158 reviews
February 13, 2009
The impact to mapmakers of Burton's travels is astounding. He traveled through many places that had never seen a white man, and took copious scientific notes. However, he also inadvertently opened these civilizations to modern diseases and the eventual rule by Europeans.

Burton was one of the most well traveled men of his time. He wrote numerous books about his travels with lengthy descriptions of places and cultures never before seen by Europeans.

Overall the book is well written and well researched. But, it wasn't as interesting to me as biographies of more recent people.
Profile Image for Tom Hill.
460 reviews13 followers
June 17, 2021
For full disclosure, I only made it halfway through this tomb of a book. I spilled my mug of tea on it while eating breakfast and rather than wait for it to dry to continue reading, I moved on. For the first third of the book, the captain seemed to be a bit player in his own biography. Later, he seems to have led a rather unusual life as a Muslim, but the author never explains why he takes secret notes on his visit to Medina and Mecca. At this point, the tea intervened and I really did not care anymore.
Profile Image for Heather.
986 reviews31 followers
July 16, 2021
This book wasn't a well balanced analysis of his life. Burton was a key figure in helping Britain colonize many countries. This book still follows the narrative of Burton as a dashing explorer rather than doing any analysis of the real impact, good or bad, of his actions.
Profile Image for Kurt.
658 reviews79 followers
March 7, 2009
A fascinating man and a fascinating life. Unfortunately, this biography was a little too academic and not as readable as I would have liked.
Profile Image for Kate.
66 reviews77 followers
August 19, 2009
Interesting dude. Boring book.
Profile Image for dr_set.
271 reviews1 follower
December 21, 2024
This is the biography of a real life Indiana Jones. Burton not only traveled four continents extensively to unknown and far away places in the middle of Africa and the Arabian peninsula, exploring, looking for gold and excavating many ruins as a lay man, and he even fought natives in Somalia armed with spears using his revolver, just like in the movies, and got staved in the face from side to side by one of them, missing several teeth in the process.

A restless traveler until the end of his life at 70, he enlisted as an officer for John Company, became one of the greatest linguist and orientalist of his time mastering dozens of languages, explored Europe, Asia, Africa, and America from Argentina to the Canada. He participated in the expedition that discovered lake Victoria, the main source of the Nile in central Africa, fought in the Crimean War, and most likely played a part on the Great Game as a spy for Britain.

He wrote dozens of books about his travels and translated many more, most notably the Kama Sutra and the Arabian Nights.

His accounts give a vivid picture of the brutality he encountered all around the world, with chilling anecdotes like a slaver king in Africa testing the guns he have brought him as presents by casually killing several of own servants like they were nothing but ants.




48 reviews6 followers
January 31, 2020
An amazing book about an amazing man and his time in history. At times, it was hard to put the book down. (Taking time to look up additional information about locations and other topics discussed in the book increased the "learning factor" from this book, too.) Overall, I found the book fascinating. It is remarkable how one person could accomplish - and survive - so much in one lifetime. My only two (mostly) minor "irritations" about this author's presentation, which mostly arose towards the end of the book, were that: at times the author seemed a bit overly eager to paint a positive-PR picture of Capt Sir Burton, and annoyingly the author seemed too eager to "put down" Mrs. Isabel (Arundell) Burton at every opportunity, which did not seem justified. In fact, it seems that Isabel, too, was an interesting, productive, adventurous woman of her time and could have been portrayed a bit better. Nonetheless, overall, I found this book to be fascinating, easy to read, and definitely worthwhile.
Profile Image for Guillaume Narbonne.
26 reviews10 followers
April 15, 2024
This isn't just a book; it's a treasure map that leads readers through the labyrinthine life of one of history's most fascinating figures. Rice doesn't just recount facts; he paints a vivid picture of a man who was part explorer, part linguist, part spy, and all legend.
From the get-go, Rice straps you into the passenger seat of Burton's life, a ride that's as thrilling as it is enlightening. Imagine being able to say you've infiltrated Mecca in disguise, translated the Kama Sutra, and brought the Arabian Nights to the West. Well, Burton could, and Rice's biography ensures you feel every bit of the adrenaline, intellectual fervor, and sheer audacity that fueled these exploits.
What sets this biography apart is its "warts and all" approach. Rice doesn't shy away from the complexities and contradictions of Burton's character. Burton's life was a full-blown epic, complete with battles, love affairs, and a fair share of controversy.
The biography explores all aspects of Burton's life, from the deserts of Arabia to the salons of Victorian England. Rice's style is engaging, and this book is a testament to the fact that history is not just a collection of dates and events, but a tapestry of human experiences, showing fascinating characters in all their complexity.
Profile Image for Richard Wise.
Author 5 books106 followers
September 24, 2017
An interesting, if at times tedious, biography of the 19th century adventurer Sir Richard Burton. I first became acquainted with Burton's Travels in The Highlands of Brazil, a book which is a must have for those collecting books on the history of gem mining and gemology.

Burton was a polymath with an exceptional aptitude for languages. He also had a deep interest in religion becoming first a Hindu and then a Moslem accepted into the Sufi Order. He was so good, in fact, that he was able to make the Haj to Mecca disguised as an Arab. He was a meticulous observer with a talent for understanding the peoples he met along the way.

Burton exemplified the type of man who lived life on his own terms. The ultimate sort of freedom! As such he is to be admired and serve as a model for us all.
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