How I Found Livingstone

Henry Morton Stanley's greeting to the Scottish medical missionary David Livingstone 'Dr Livingstone, I presume?' is to exploration what Holmes's 'Elementary, my dear Watson' is to detective fiction. It took place in a remote African settlement when a travelling correspondent for the New York Herald successfully concluded an assignment to find the renowned explorer. But the meeting, and the events surrounding it, proved to be more than just a simple news story. Stanley's accounts of his expedition not only helped transform Livingstone into one of the great Victorian heroes, but were also the springboard from which Stanley himself became the most accomplished of all African explorers.

How I Found Livingstone was written in six weeks, published in November 1872, and had sold through three printings by Christmas. For Stanley was not only a great explorer, he was also one of the most talented writers ever to tell the tale of travel and discovery in Africa. His account of his journey through East Africa, and his time spent investigating Lake Tanganyika with Livingstone, is one of the classics of African exploration.