Customer Reviews

The Rivers Ran East: Travelers' Tales Classics

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Doing some research on family history I found an old clipping that details an incident in Canton, China in 1949. Leonard Clark and H. E. Harris were staying at the house of Willard Freeman, Vice President of International Suppliers Corporation which was owned by Whiting Willaur, a close associate of Claire Chenault. Harris and Freeman were killed by shots fired from a pistol owned by Clark. Freeman "pulled a jealousy act on me" according to Clark, referring to Freeman's belief that Clark was involved with Freeman's "blonde, Polish-born wife". Harris was shot three times and died at the scene, Freeman was shot twice and died later in hospital in Canton. Clark was shot once in the chest and survived. Clark was arrested and charged with the murders of Harris and Freeman, but never tried. Perhaps because the Nationalist regime collapsed a few months later. It would be interesting to know the background to this incident.

Having lived in the Amazon valley (Santa Isabel do Rio Negro, on the upper Rio Negro just south of the equator, and also on the Amazon near Manaus), for ten years, I find much of the book amusing. It is inconceivable that Clark is the only explorer that ran into more horrifying Indians, more snakes and other jungle creature out to get him than any other who had gone before him.

For example, Clark wasn't fond of swimming in the river because there were crocs on every shore, and flesh eating fish at every depth. Explorer Adrian Cowell (The Heart of the Forest), found nothing like this in all his travels and even snorkeled at the Xingu tribe he stayed with. Earlier, Earl Hanson in Journey to Manaos found most of the Indians quite curious. My sister has worked with tribal Indians in Brazil for 35 years and has never reported such savagery. The Indians are known for killing, but usually out of fear - not because they are simply mean.

Loren McIntyre paints a totally different picture of the Amazon and its people in Amazonia (Sierra Club). Don't forget Teddy Roosevelt. He had a great time on the Amazon. And finally, Alfred Wallace's Travels on the Amazon and Rio Negro (1889), talks of Indians and fauna, but never had the problems Clark had.

It is my guess that Clark, knowing no one would be able to confirm or deny his wild tales, took poetic license and created a story that is a great read, but simply not totally factual. It is his vivid imagination that makes the journey even more exciting - but I was disappointed because I thought I was going to read a nice historical account of his travels and instead caught myself laughing to myself in disbelief.

I suppose I could be wrong. I've never been to the Amazon in the Peruvian headwaters. Life may be quite different there than the rest of the basin.

Leonard Clark was my uncle, and the new edition having been released, I have recently re-read The Rivers Ran East.

I found this book to be most incredible, not simply for the storytelling, but more importantly for Len's foresight into the value and preciousness of the South American rainforest. While he was admittedly not an environmentalist, he was truly a man ahead of his times in that respect. His appreciation for and finely detailed descriptions of the flora and fauna of the Amazon River basin are extremely topical and perhaps even more pertinent today than when he wrote the book. Among all else, he identifies specific native tribal practices and forest herbs as remedies unknown by Western medicine; as with many other products of the rainforest, these hold great promise and yet remain unresearched. Furthermore, his anthropological descriptions of the Amazonian natives capture a culture that now, just 50 years later, has largely been transformed to modern society and lost.

Purely on a swash-buckling adventure-tale level, the book is priceless: this is a real-life Indiana Jones! Len's hair-raising stunts, death-defying experiences, and encounters with Amazonian headhunters hit the reader one after another with nearly a breath in between.

Altogether five of Leonard's books were published: A Wanderer Till I Die (1937), The Rivers Ran East (1953), The Marching Wind (1954), Explorer's Digest (1955), and Yucatan Adventure (posthumously in 1958). All five make for fascinating reading. Many of his books were translated into Italian, Japanese, and other languages. My mother was Len's younger half-sister and I inherited her collection, which includes first editions in English of all five, as well as several of the translated versions, for example, the Japanese edition of The Marching Wind. In addition to The Rivers Ran East, The Marching Wind has also recently been republished and is now also available on Amazon.com. Beyond his books, articles by Len were published in National Geographic, Life, Literary Digest, Field and Stream, Popular Science, and American Weekly. The family still receives inquiries from time to time about possibly make a film based on one of his adventures, but none has been produced to date.

All of Len's books except for A Wanderer Till I Die were written after World War II. However, it was during the war that he perhaps made his greatest - though unpublished - contributions. Leonard served as an officer in the OSS, spending a good portion of the war in the China-Burma-India corridor conducting intelligence work in the Yellow River valley. Near the end of the war, he was stationed on Formosa and accepted the first (unofficial) surrender of the Japanese there. He earned the Legion of Merit, the Bronze Star, and the Order of the White Cloud with Ribbon, the highest honor given by the Chinese to the foreigners who served them.

All of Leonard's works are fact, not fiction, and he is very highly regarded in our family as a military hero and quintessential adventurer. After the war, he built a log cabin near Fresno, California that I visited as a child. I remember Len as a large, quiet, gentle man who liked to tease us children, smoke his pipe, and take long contemplative walks in the woods with my mother. Yet he also embodied a sophistication, powerfulness, and seriousness that I sensed even as a child.

Len was born on 1/6/1907. He died on 5/4/1957 under mysterious circumstances while exploring for gold and diamond mines on the Caroni River in Venezuela. You will find a fairly extensive biography in Current Biography, Volume 17, No. 1, January 1956, although this does not cover his last years. In addition, my father devoted 20 pages in our family history to Len. For more information, please feel free to contact me.

I was desperate for a another good travel memoir after traveling with Redmond O'Hanlon in South America and Eric Hansen in Borneo, so I ordered this after accidentally discovering it here. Well, I was not prepared for this journey. My jaw hit the floor on the first page and remained there throughout the whole incredible story. Clark's quirky personality and unbounded enthusiasm and belief in this trek to find the fabled Seven Cities of Cibola captured my imagination and had I been lucky enough to have been asked along on this trek, I would have followed without question. And all because of a treasure map someone sold him! The description of the silver and gold objects that had been reported was the most fabulous thing I had ever read or heard of. His ingenuity in getting over the difficult parts of the rivers on the trip out was amazing and his harrowing trek back to civilization kept me on the edge of my chair. And how clever of him to keep the best secret until last--they actually found gold. And Inez! No woman ever had a more interesting journey or life. I think young teens all the way up to seniors would be amazed to read about the part she played in this fabulous adventure. Before I really start gushing adjectives, I'll quit and just say read it. Mystery fans, history buffs, travel junkies, amateur biologists and anthropologists and adventure addicts--this book has something for everyone of you. I didn't realize he had written so many other books and I intend to get as many as possible and I suggest you do the same.

Simply one of the best and most exciting books I've ever read. This book definitely tops my favorites list. If adventure travel and/or reading is your thing, this book is for you. I was fortunate enough to find and read an original copy some years back and was surprised to see it reprinted and for sale here. I will definitely be getting a few copies as presents for people as the years go by. Enjoy!

I've nothing to add to the others reviews, because you've said all. I can only add that I've read this book for the first time when I was fourteen and today, that I'm 46 years old, I've read it again experiencing the same emotions!
Contact me to have the full list of books and articles written by leonard Clark

I've nothing to add to the others reviews, because you've said all. I can only add that I've read this book for the first time when I was fourteen and today, that I'm 46 years old, I've read it again experiencing the same emotions! Now I want publish all that I found on the web: all the books and articles and the links to buy them and have more informations too!
You can find informations on the author and his masterpiece "The rivers ran east" on... and here an abstract follows "Leonard Clark [1907(1905?) - 1957)] was perhaps one of the greatest of all twentieth-century explorers. He did not believe in big expeditions and elaborate paraphernalia - he was a man who carried his own belongings and charged ahead. This same trait enabled him to perform extraordinary feats of military intelligence and reconnaissance in difficult and dangerous areas during World War II. Clark attended the University of California, then joined the army, attaining the rank of colonel. During the war, he spent many months in China behind Japanese lines organizing guerrilla activity. His post-war expeditions began in Borneo, and over the years he made trips to Mexico, the Celebes, Sumatra, China, India, Japan, Central America, South America, and Burma." He passed away in 1957 at the age of 49, while on a diamond-mining expedition in Venezuela"
He wrote:
A wanderer till I die [1937] very rare
An article on National Geographic magazine - September 1938
Among the big knot lois of Hainan: wild tribesmen with topknots roam the little-known interior of this big and strategically important island in the china sea [1938]
The Rivers ran east [1953]... - translated in italian by Garzanti...
The marching wind [c1955]...
Yucatan adventure [1959]...
Alle sorgenti del fiume giallo [1996 ] italian edition...
I hope I've found something interesting for all!

I recently finished reading the book, The Rivers Ran East, by Leonard Clark, who just happens to be my uncle. What a great story! It was written in the 1950's when I was just a little girl and I grew up hearing exciting stories about my adventuresome uncle. He sure can tell an fascinating tale! The book has been out of print in English for quite some time, so it is exciting to see that it has been republished. Because of the vivid descriptions, you really feel as though you are there with him in the jungle.

Several years ago I made the mistake of lending out my original copy to I-don't-remember-whom. Big mistake. This is my favorite book, ever, and I'm SO happy it's back in print! Other travellers will identify with the problem of what's it like to be a complete stranger, with little familiarity of the circumstances surrounding you, but Clark's travels might as well have been on another planet, for all he was able to deal with the problems thrown at him. Exciting reading, and lots to think about afterwards. I just want to know, is all that gold still there???? This time around I'm ordering two copies, just in case one goes astray again.