ABSTRACT
Africa's largest island—fourth in the world after Greenland, New Guinea, and Borneo—Madagascar marks the southwest comer of the vast Indian Ocean triangle, flanking the long coast of Mozambique. The hourglass channel between them narrows to 400 kilometers between Cap St. André and Moçambique Island, billowing wide to 1,000 kilometers at its northern and southern apertures. Tantamount to a small continent both in extent and complexity, Madagascar spans from north to south as far (1,606 kilometers) as the distance between Boston and Atlanta. Its people, the Malagasy, consider their island as a continental expanse rather than as a maritime spot surrounded by ocean. In French, it is familiarly known as "the great island" (la grande île).
