Douglas Rogers (writer)

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Douglas Rogers
Born (1968-11-11) 11 November 1968 (age 55)
travel writer, memoirist
Notable creditAuthor of The Last Resort (2009)[2]
SpouseGrace Cutler[1]

Douglas Rogers (born 11 November 1968) is a

Zimbabwean
journalist, travel writer, and memoirist.

Biography

Rogers was born and raised in

Umtali, Rhodesia[1] to Lyn, a lawyer, and Rosalind, a drama teacher. He grew up on heavily fortified chicken and grape farms during the Rhodesian Bush War, with his three sisters and parents. He survived a car crash when he was 11 years old; the car had sped off a cliff in the Nyanga mountains, and a female passenger was killed.[2]

He attended Chancellor Junior School and Mutare Boys High, and later boarded at Prince Edward School in Harare.[2][1] After graduating, with a journalism degree, from

Sunday Telegraph in 1997. He has also written extensively for The Daily Telegraph, The Guardian, and Travel + Leisure.[1]

In 2003, Rogers moved to the United States, on a media visa sponsored by fellow Zimbabwean and Telegraph travel editor,

Gotham Writers Workshop.[1]

Personal life

Rogers currently lives in Brooklyn, New York, with his wife Grace Cutler,[1] a television news producer from New Jersey,[citation needed] and their children.[1]

The Last Resort

Overview

In 2009,[3] Rogers published a part-memoir, part-travelogue, The Last Resort, concerning his parents' struggle to stay afloat in modern-day Zimbabwe, coping with inflation, and warding off land invasions.

He also describes meeting several of the employees, and short- and long-term tenants who stayed in his parents' holiday cottages before and after the tourism industry broke down. The residents include a mercenary named Mac, evicted white farmers, prostitutes and a brothel manager, a descendant of Andries Pretorius, a former captain of the Rhodesian rugby team who is related to F. W. de Klerk, diamond dealers, as well as a nurse who assisted in the theatre as Christiaan Barnard performed the world's first ever heart transplantation. Another resident is the brother of Abel Muzorewa, who briefly was Prime Minister of Zimbabwe Rhodesia.

Reception

The Sunday Times praised the book as it "captures the rich humanity – the friendship, bravery, stoicism and unfailing humour – of the millions of black and white Zimbabweans." The reviewer continued to describe the book as "utterly engrossing; a vivid chronicle of the disintegration of a post-colonial nation, and the rebirth of a multiethnic African society."[4] The Daily Telegraph reviewer felt the memoir stands apart from its counterparts: "What distinguishes Douglas Rogers's book from others is that there is a genuine narrative thread to his story, the characters are interesting and well observed, and the author's humanity and integrity is consistently on display."[5]

In 2010, the book won the

Dolman Best Travel Book Award
.

See also

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h "About". Douglas Rogers. Retrieved 3 May 2016.
  2. ^
    ISBN 9780307407979
    .
  3. ^ "The Exchange: Douglas Rogers". The New Yorker. 16 December 2009.
  4. ^ " The Last Resort: A Zimbabwe Memoir by Douglas Rogers". Sunday Times. 2 May 2010.
  5. ^ "The Last Resort: a Zimbabwe Memoir: Review". The Daily Telegraph. 13 July 2010.
  6. ^ "BGTW ANNOUNCES BRITAIN'S TOP TRAVEL WRITERS & PHOTOGRAPHERS 2010". British Guild of Travel Writers. 10 November 2010. Archived from the original on 11 January 2016.

External links

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