Kon-Tiki and I is “a sketch book of the famous Kon-Tiki expedition by the navigator of the voyage,” Erik Hesselberg. I saw this unique book at the Arundel flea market in Maine this past Saturday. It’s a terrific book of drawings and tells Erik Hesselberg’s story about being on the voyage from when he left his wife and daughter to go to South America, the crazy reactions of people when he told what he the expedition was going to do, the chopping down of the balsa wood in a Peruvian forest, etc. I think this may be a very early form of nonfiction personal graphic narrative. It’s from 1950. This is the English version. The Norwegian edition was published the year before. It’s the only book Hesselberg produced that I could find. Read a couple of pages. He has a sweet, natural tone and still, after over 70 years, draws the reader in.
In later years, he would travel the world, wed a few more times, and become friends with Jean Cocteau and Picasso. He was an interesting character.
Here are the first 25 pages that I shot in the morning sun with my phone on the side porch just before 8am.
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