Who left his primitive tribe and went to Europe, then wrote a book about it?

Are you thinking of Oofty Goofty, the Wild Man of Borneo, from the late 1800’s?

no but thanks anyway, the man I’m thinking of travelled to Europe and then wrote about it. I don’t think he performed or did anything of particular interest while he was in Europe. The reason he is famous is because of the book he wrote later. I think it’s called something like “My travels to the white people’s land” or something along those lines (like Frodo’s “There and back again”). The reason he is famous is the precise reason I want to read his book: at a time when white folk were “discovering” and “exploring” the rest of the world, one of the “discovered” people explores their own homelands, seeing things from a completely different perspective.

Jack Black? not the one from here but from there.

You could begin with a search in the National Library of Australia, Indonesian Acquisitions. I could not get the National Library of Indonesia to download, but the NLA, according to its website, has the largest collection of Indonesian materials in the world (presumably outside Indonesia). One of its sections is headed “Indonesian resources from the Dutch period.” If you have a good internet connection and plenty of patience, you can pick up a surprising amount of information.

@Jack79 Don’t have an answer but hey – how are you?

never got my answer, I assumed it was a famous book, but google searches didn’t bring up anything remotely familiar

I’m ok janbb, got a new baby daughter plus two stepsons now, but my eldest still has problems. Life revolves around children when you’re a parent. How are you?

PM’d you.

I think the details are a little too vague for a good Google search for your book.

There’s a site for booklovers called LibraryThing.com. It has a section devoted to helpiing people rediscover a book whose title they can’t recall. The group page is here.

You can join, participate, and list up to 200 books for free. A lifetime membership costs $25.

What an interesting site. I am now a member.

It is quite an interesting site with a very good search feature, but unfortunately did not have the book I was looking for. I’m 99% sure it’s Hermann Hesse though, and I found the book which I think mentioned this one. I also remember where I read it, so that sort of narrows it down. I was hoping the internet would speed up my search, but I guess I’ll just have to go through the more traditional route: track down my friend who owned the book, then read the bio inside which includes mention of the particular publication. I’m still surprised it’s not mentioned online though, maybe Hesse’s role was obscure (perhaps he paid for the book to be published, hosted the author in his home or had some other minor role that is not worth mentioning online).

@Jack79, I wasn’t speaking of the search function. Within the site there’s a group called “Name that Book” that describes itself this way:

Have you forgotten the name of a book you once read? This group is here to help you find it again.

Start your book search by clicking on the ‘Post a new topic’ option and…
(1) Enter a helpful Subject line that includes a genre and a clue.
(2) Enter all the book detail you remember in the Message block.
(3) Check back for responses!

I’m omitting all the detail here, but it’s at the second link I gave you. Examples of successful and ongoing search threads are on that page as well.

LibraryThing has a registered membership of more than 1.4 million. The odds are pretty good that someone who knows your book will see the query.

I hope that when you find it, you’ll come back and tell us what it was.

Yes, thanks, thought I had posted the question but apparently I hadn’t. Tried it again now.