Mad About the Mekong: Exploration and Empire in South East Asia

Fascinating account of a French exploration all the way up the Mekong river starting in 1866. At that time, the French controlled only a bit of South Vietnam (around Saigon) but were already scheming in Cambodia, and thinking of expanding their reign into Northern Vietnam ('Tonkin' in contemporary parlance). Following the Mekong into what is now Laos seemed a logical idea for various reasons - not the least of which was that it might enable them to establish a purely French commercial route into Southern China, at a time that the British seemed to be more and more in control of China's Eastern coast. Since the British were already expanding into Burma (it would become a protectorate in the 1880s), and were influential in Siam, establishing French domination of the unknown upper Mekong seemed a necessity. As the writer points out, despite the apparent lack of promise in these steaming jungles, the miniature 'Great Game' between France and Britain in this region should be seen against the background of the time: on the one hand fewer and fewer 'new' regions were left for colonization, on the other hand, France under Napoleon III (and later after the 1870/1 humiliation) was hell-bent on improving its colonial standing.I won't give away what happened on this dramatic journey of discovery, but I will say that I greatly enjoyed this book. It adequately mentions Dutch efforts in the 17th century, the language is flowery, it often switches back and forth between times before (the Khmer empire around Angkor Wat, say) and after (the 1970s Golden Triangle, say) the actual expedition, to the expedition's fate itself. Definitely recommended, not least because the interesting history of French Indochina is not extensively treated in English literature - it seems as if the Nile was the only river whose origins were to be discovered (at around the same time)..... Amazingly, according to the writer, even the French themselves seem to have forgotten about the epic feats of their own explorers. Odd!

This book is an extraordinary achievement. The author tells the story of one of the great expeditions of all time, showing how the personalities of the men led to its successes and its failures. And into this he weaves the history of, above all, Laos as well as comments on South-East Asia in general. I couldn't put it down as I sat beside the Mekong in Luang Prabang.

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This a book about a forgotton French expedition up the Mekong in the nineteenth century. The reason that it was forgotten was that the travellers were inexpressibly dull, the scenery pretty monotonous (1000 miles of riverbank) and the history of the area lacking in any deeds of moment and seemingly devoid of any characters of interest.One can only blame Keay for writing the book. He also moves around in time a lot to explain the subsequent history of the area traversed. I suspect the is to alleviate his own boredom. It doesn't work.Anyway, I was glad to finish the book and be rid of those bearded frenchies forever. Ha ha!

The book is bit overrated.