The Journey of Anders Sparrman

Anders Sparrman, b.1748, the son of a country rector in Uppsala, studies medicine and becomes an apostle of the botanist Carl Linnaeus. He sails as a ship's doctor to China.

In 1772 he becomes tutor to the children of the Swedish Resident in Cape Town, from there joins Cook's second voyage to Antarctica and Tahiti as assistant to the German botanists Johann and Georg Forster. He travels to the African interior with his guide, Daniel Immelman and later writes 'A voyage to the Cape of Good Hope', towards the Antarctic polar circle, and round the world: But chiefly into the country of the Hottentots and Caffres, from the year 1772 to 1776. In Stockolm, he is appointed keeper of natural historical collections but quarrels with his colleagues. He then travels to Senegal, witnesses the cruelty of slavery. Anders testifies for abolitionists in London.

In Stockholm he is dismissed from his post at the Academy and works as a doctor among the poor. He falls in love with his housemaid, Lotta Fries. They have a daughter. Sparrman died in 1820.