Product Description

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #97437 in Books
• Published on: 2009-04-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 688 pages

Features

• ISBN13: 9780547238234
• Condition: NEW
• Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
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Amazon.com Review
Environmental historian Linda Lear does justice to the tragic dimensions of Rachel Carson's life in her prologue, which shows the author of Silent Spring, even as she was dying of cancer, testifying calmly before a congressional subcommittee whose investigation of the dangers of pesticides were prompted by her book. Lear portrays Carson (1907-1964) with affection and discernment as a remarkable woman who overcame prejudice against female scientists and aroused post-World War II America to the beauties of nature and the technological threats against it in a series of deservedly popular books.

From Library Journal
From childhood days, Carson loved nature while showing enormous promise as an author. In college, she began as an English major before switching to biology, and in her federal government job, she used her scientific training to write many publications. In 1951, Carson published her first best seller, The Sea Around Us. Ten years later, while fighting a losing battle with breast cancer, she published Silent Spring, which generated enormous controversy. Environmental historian Lear presents a mostly affectionate and satisfying portrait of Carson. An afterword with information on what happened to Carson's ward, Roger; her close friend Dorothy Freeman; and others would have been appreciated. Lear also fails to explore fully the contradictions in Carson's life, such as her willingness to abide familial manipulations while letting nothing stand in her way when working on a project. Nevertheless, this is an excellent treatment of a founder of modern environmentalism. Recommended.
-?Randy Dykhuis, Michigan Lib. Consortium, Lansing
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Scientific American
She is standing in profile, head tilted upward, unsmiling, concentrating; she seems immensely still. This black-and-white portrait, the cover illustration for Linda Lear's biography of Rachel Carson, feels like a gray day at the seashore. The grainy, calm image immediately establishes what Lear makes clear in her exhaustively researched, voluminous book: the famous conservationist, scientist, author of Silent Spring and three lyrical books about the oceans, was solitary, serious and close to a force of nature herself. In Rachel Carson: Witness for Nature, Lear explores the roots of Carson's powerful, visceral connection to the natural world, to writing and to science. And by placing Carson's influences, complexities and accomplishments in their historical context, Lear--a professor of environmental history at George Washington University, who is also affiliated with the Smithsonian Institution--describes the profound effect that this writer and thinker had on American society. The book begins and ends with Carson dying of cancer, shortly after Silent Spring--which was published in 1962--began to galvanize the country to ban the use of the pesticide DDT. This circularity imparts a sense of fatalism to the biography as well as to Carson's life. Deep respect for and love of nature inevitably drove Carson to what was an entirely unlikely role for an intensely private, socially awkward person: that of advocate and catalyst. Carson was born in 1907 to a somewhat troubled family. Her father was generally absent, and her two siblings were older and often without moorings--something that later became a burden to Carson. She spent most of her childhood with her mother, Maria, reading aloud, studying and exploring the Pennsylvania countryside. Maria's respect for nature was such that she would have her children return to the forest the items they had collected on their walks. "This kind of care for the natural world had a spiritual dimension that at least her youngest daughter embraced and would practice all her life," Lear writes. Indeed, whatever Carson wrote about the environment was infused with spirituality, as is evident in this passage from a draft of her 1955 book, The Edge of the Sea: "There is symbolic as well as actual beauty in the migration of the birds; in the ebb and flow of the tides, responding to sun and moon as they have done for untold millions of years; in the repose of the folded bud in winter, ready within its sheath for the spring. There is something infinitely healing in these repeated refrains of nature, the assurance that after night, dawn comes, and spring after the winter." From the outset, Carson was as drawn to reading and writing as she was to nature. At the age of 11 she published her first short story, and when she entered the Pennsylvania College for Women, she expected to pursue her literary interests. But there she became enamored of biology, because, as Lear describes, it "revealed yet another way for Rachel to love nature." She went on to graduate work at Johns Hopkins University, spending some summers at the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, Mass., studying marine life. In the mid-1930s Carson joined the Fish and Wildlife Service, where she became an editor and writer. In this position, Carson began to realize her mission. She wrote pamphlets, articles, speeches and books about nature, conservation and, particularly, the oceans--bridging the gap between the worlds of literature and of science. Lear explains that Carson never saw the sea until she was in college, but when she did, she began to see that the story she wanted to use her life to tell was the story of the oceans. Her three poetic books did just that. Under the Sea-Wind (1941), The Sea Around Us (1951) and The Edge of the Sea transformed many Americans' relationship to nature. At one point in 1952, her first two books were both on the New York Times best-seller list. Lear chronicles what seems to be every detail of Carson's life, friendships and work. Although this is a monumental accomplishment--a quick glance at the sources, bibliography and 94 pages of notes conveys just how monumental--the information weighs heavy at times. Carson's concerns about finances, for instance, provide an important insight into her character. Yet Lear's inclusion of so many financial transactions is dulling, as is the record of what seems like every exchange with Carson's editors and publishers. Lear's writing does not have the poetic grace of her subject's works, but it does have everything else Carson strove for: exactitude, thoroughness and context.

Customer Reviews

Thank You Rachel
How many people today remember Rachel Carson? When you see an eagle or a falcon or a hawk, you can than k Rachel Carson. Her book "Silent Spring" incited action almost immediately against irresponsible pesticide use, including DDT, and launched an ecology movement that led to the Clean Water Act and the Clean Air Act. This is quite an accomplishment for an author of natural history books; Rachel Carson must have been larger than life, practically immortal, in order to have pulled this off.

But...as Linda Lear documents in extraordinary detail, Rachel Carson was entirely mortal, and all too human, and was not lacking in the faults most of us possess. Success came to Carson late (almost too late), but Carson's love of nature and her dogged determination allowed her to complete what is, perhaps, the most important book of the 20th Century before she succumbed to breast cancer. Lear's detail is incredibly deep; over and again she recounts instances from Carson's life that seem trivial and mundane until the reader feels bogged down in the excess of it. But this detail is critical, because Carson's life itself seemed mundane and trivial, that is until the last decade of it. Carson was a regular person-she was no superstar-and Lear's depth of detail is necessary in order to explain Carson's journey from a less-than-middle-class upbringing to government functionary to the preeminent nature writer of her time. Carson's life evolves slowly and ends tragically; she never married and she never had children-it is almost as if she was born to deliver "Silent Spring" at exactly the right moment in history, when it was needed the most, and then pass on.

In "Witness for Nature", Linda Lear does not allow Rachel Carson to become a cardboard icon of an earlier time; Lear recreates Carson as a complete person with loves and fears and faults. Carson's greatness rises on its own from Lear's writing.

For more information about Rachel Carson, also read Kirk Ward Robinson's "Founding Courage."

Extrordinary biography of an extrordinary woman.
Lear's detailed biography offers an unmatched look at Carson's personal and professional life. This book takes the reader behind the scenes of Rachel Carson's brilliant works in order to demonstrate the difficulties that dogged her every day existance. Lear chronicles Carson's personal perservance and dedication to the environmental cause in an immensely readable format. A wonderful and inspiring book to read!

Renew your faith in humanity...read this book
The first reviewer, Shari Just, has captured perfectly the quality, scope and value of Lear's biography. If you have ever wondered "can one person make a difference" this is the proof. A readable blend of history, place, people and events describing a modest scientist that loved to communicate scientific findings to a wider audience.