A Sporting Life

Most books about big-game hunting are written by or are about famous hunters, and, frequently, these books of derring-do only relate the success stories and not the things that can go wrong or the hunts that failed. Martinez de Hoz considers himself an average international hunter, and writes to an audience who yearns to understand the difficulties an amateur faces when going on safari, and he justifies his writings on the grounds that his adventures could prove useful, entertaining, and downright helpful. He also enhances the events he relates by putting them in the broader context of history, geography, nature, wildlife, and human characteristics. Many events are both humorous and enlightening, such as his tale on how to be deserving to hunt a lion or how to deal with a Mongolian interpreter who gets drunk on the eve of taking a High Altai argali.