Born Free

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The UK’s last dolphinarium closed its doors due to the introduction of tighter new industry standards, following a campaign by Born Free. We donated funds to support a conservation project protecting Ghana’s last viable chimpanzee population. Every child needs to own this book and every parent needs to read it. A simplified version of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights is presented via the brilliant illustrations of some of the world’s most wonderful illustrators. All royalties from this book are donated to Amnesty International.' This is the book the film was based upon, the story of Elsa the lioness, hand raised by a Senior Game Warden and his wife, Joy Adamson, and later released into the wild. This would be rated five stars except that I really try to be stingy with those. The book didn't make me cry, laugh-out-loud or change my thinking, and Adamson, while she writes well and fluently, doesn't have the impressive, lyrical prose of Beryl Markham and Isak Dinesen, two other European women who wrote celebrated memoirs about their time in Kenya.

We launched our Global Friends education initiative, linking communities and schools in Asia and Africa with neighbouring wildlife projects, and providing vital resources and positive action for wildlife.Learning about the plight of wild animals during the making of the film was a life-changing experience for Virginia and Bill, who went on to make a number of wildlife films and documentaries together, including An Elephant Called Slowly with a young wild-caught elephant calf called Pole Pole. After filming, Pole Pole was gifted to London Zoo by the Kenyan government despite Virginia and Bill’s protests. Years later, Virginia and Bill went to the zoo to visit Pole Pole. Seeing her distress, they launched a campaign for her release, but Pole Pole died in 1983, aged just 16. I had read about Joy and George in previous books I had read - A Lion Called Christian and Born Wild, so I felt it necessary to read about Joy's own experiences.

Making Born Free led me, and my husband Bill, towards the realisation that wild animals should not be used for entertainment, and that wild animals are so intrinsically linked to their wild habitats that they simply don’t belong in captivity. Joy Adamson put me in mind a little of Karen Blixen and Out of Africa and Shadows on the Grass, two non-Britons writing these archetypal books about British Empire Kenya. Blixen though was more of a stylist. Adamson's prose is plain and simple, ideal for young readers or those learning English. Adamson was born Friederike Viktoria Gessner in the Austro-Hungarian Empire (specifically the area of the Czech republic), she proceeded through a series of marriages to end up as Joy Adamson married to a game warden, both she and her husband eventually died violent deaths, Joy's murderer eventually claiming that he killed her over a wage dispute after she shot at him see here. However, such is life, and at no time during the read did i feel resentful towards the author, for she was just being faithful to the events, rather than choosing to gloss over the more tedious bits.Adamson's writing flows like a conversation between friends. The adventures with Elsa touch you in a very special way that true stories usually do. I had moments of laughter and smiles as well as tears. We helped International Animal Rescue care for rescued ‘dancing’ sloth bears in India, by funding a vet clinic. A story of Elsa a lion cub raised and loved by Joy and George. A telling of the hardship for both Elsa and her human family. It seemed at times to be unattainable and a failure. The life for Elsa was torn between that of being a pet or living a free life in the wild as she was meant to have. The steps in her life are told in many fun and hard adventures. Elsa finally is her own lioness but she never forgets her human family. I appreciate this was wrote in the late 50's, so alot of the language is not necessarily PC and at times felt a bit uncomfortable. I also understand this was about trying to introduce a lioness to the wild, but there was alot of "we saw a cobra, george shot it", "there was a fly, we shot it", with some of the animal killings feeling pointless.

I need a cup of hot cocoa and the memory erasing machine from Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.Born Free merged with wildlife charity Care for the Wild, a new alliance uniting two of the leading names in wildlife protection.