The following extracts are of Rollo's meeting with Tom Neale: click here and here
I wrote elsewhere about Tom Neale and his book "An Island To Oneself" - click here. I only found this inspiring book in my retirement and have sometimes wondered if I had "done a Tom Neale" had I read his life-changing book fifty years earlier.
[I almost finished up living on a tiny island back in 1969 at the tender age of 24 - see here; instead, I finished up living and working on the world's second-largest island, New Guinea.]
Many years later I came across Rollo Gebhard's book "Ein Mann und sein Boot - 4 Jahre allein um die Welt" ("A Man and his Boat - 4 years alone around the world"). What made this book particularly interesting to me was Rollo's meeting with Tom Neale on Suwarrow Atoll. Not only did he visit him on his island on both his first and second circumnavigation, but he also had taped an interview with Tom in November 1976.
He wrote about it in "Ein Mann und sein Boot" in German but how much better would it be to hear it in English from the man himself! I emailed Rollo's wife Angelika Gebhard in Bad Wiessee in Germany who promptly replied, "In dem Film über die zweite Allein-Weltumsegelung (1975-79) meines Mannes ist ein Interview mit Tom Neale enthalten. Der Film wurde damals im ZDF ausgestrahlt." ("The interview is included in the movie my husband made during his second circumnavigation which back then had gone to air on the commercial television station ZDF.")
How to get hold of that movie? It was not on YouTube and not available on ebay or anywhere else. Frau Gebhard had the solution, "Das ZDF besitzt die Urheberrechte an dem Film, und ich vermute, dass es sehr schwierig bis unmöglich sein wird, ihn über das ZDF zu erwerben. Aber ich habe den Film, den wir für die Vorträge geschnitten haben. Ich könnte Ihnen den Teil mit dem Interview zukommen lassen, wenn Sie den Film nur privat einsetzen." ("The television station owns the copyrights to the movie, and it would be difficult if not impossible to get a copy. However, I could send you a copy of the part containing the interview for your own personal use.")
Unfortunatey, for copyright reasons I'm not at liberty to publish the full clip on YouTube
And so it came to pass that for the first time ever I was able to listen to the voice of my long-time hero Tom Neale and watch him as he was interviewed on his island by Rollo Gebhard. Obviously, I cannot show you the footage for copyright reasons but I can give you a transcript:
(Rollo) "You have done something many people dream about. You are living on a small island far away from civilisation. Are you happy?"
(Tom) "Yes, yes, I'm happy here."
(Rollo) "And would you recommend this lifestyle to other people?"
(Tom) "No, not exactly. I would have to know a person very, very well first before I could recommend a life like this. You must remember, before I came here I had many years of experience of life in these Pacific islands and I knew what to expect. How could I tell if someone else could cope with things here or whether he could stand being alone. We are not all the same, you know. I'm a person who doesn't mind being alone. I've always been that way, more or less."
Here are a few frames from that film of Tom Neale on his island. I hope the film will one day be freely available on YouTube:
Long after the last page of "An Island To Oneself" is turned, even after Tom Neale's name is forgotten, the story of his isolation, hundreds of miles away from the nearest inhabited island, will continue to enrich the lives of all who read his book. You, too, may read it here or here.
