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Disequilibrium: A Memoir of Africa, Wildlife, and Bipolar Disorder
Paperback
ISBN13: 9781733462709
Publisher: Peter H Bechtel
Published: Dec 2 2019
Pages: 312
Weight: 1.01
Height: 0.70 Width: 6.00 Depth: 9.00
Language: English
Manic, mad, wild and hilarious... this is a powerful book. The author's bipolar disorder is at first hinted at and then revealed, but this is no surprise since the very pace, audacity and honesty of the writing mirror his condition. Antonia Murphy, practicing psychotherapist and author of Out of this World: Suicide Examined (Karnak, 2017).
With unvarnished honesty, Peter Bechtel weaves his experiences working in wildlife conservation in a remote area of Mozambique with his own bi-polar condition, so that the two apparently unrelated facets of his life become one. He tells his story without self-pity or self-aggrandisement.
Bechtel's spare and informal writing style keeps his story moving and - despite so many trials - entertaining. Africa leaps off the page; you squint at the glare of sunset on the Indian Ocean, sweat in the muggy mid-day heat of the forest after a rain, and squirm as local villagers and first-world aid workers discuss and negotiate, but never quite communicate.
Bechtel leads you through his kaleidoscope world, not so much tour guide as fellow traveller, struggling as you do to make sense of it all. The journey offers new insights into the heretofore unrelated arts of living with bipolar and the conservation of wildlife. Jenny Vaughan, author and editor (Longman Kenya, the Zimbabwe Publishing House, and the Zimbabwe Review).
Peter Bechtel is the founder of three major conservation areas in Mozambique: the Quirimbas National Park; the Lake Niassa Reserve; and the Ilhas Primeiras and Segundas Marine Reserve. He was instrumental in the establishment of the Biofund, Mozambique's first Trust Fund for the Conservation of Nature (http: //www.biofund.org.mz), and was the driving force behind the CARE-WWF Alliance, established in 2008 to address the root causes of poverty and environmental degradation (https: //www.worldwildlife.org/partnerships/care-wwf-alliance) He also battles bipolar disorder and alcoholism.
Disequilibrium tells the story of the creation of the Quirimbas National Park and the author's simultaneous descent into the uncontrolled cycles of mania and depression that characterize bipolar disorder and threaten the lives and wellbeing of those affected. The author's struggles to establish the park in the face of widespread poaching and appalling human poverty parallel his painstaking efforts to regain both 'a functional approximation of sanity' and then the love and respect of his wife and family. A photo gallery accompanies the text.
Disequilibrium brings hope not just for those facing personal challenges, but for all of us as we look for ways to live in harmony with nature on a rapidly depleting planet.
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