HomeGroupsTalkMoreZeitgeist
Search Site
This site uses cookies to deliver our services, improve performance, for analytics, and (if not signed in) for advertising. By using LibraryThing you acknowledge that you have read and understand our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy. Your use of the site and services is subject to these policies and terms.

Results from Google Books

Click on a thumbnail to go to Google Books.

Gilbert White: A Biography of the Author of…
Loading...

Gilbert White: A Biography of the Author of The Natural History of Selborne (original 1986; edition 1986)

by Richard Mabey

MembersReviewsPopularityAverage ratingConversations
651402,564 (4.1)None
This is the award winning biography of the great naturalist Gilbert White (1720-93). When he wrote The Natural History of Selborne, he created one of the greatest and most influential natural history works of all time, his detailed observations providing the cornerstones to modern ecology.
Member:PickledOnion42
Title:Gilbert White: A Biography of the Author of The Natural History of Selborne
Authors:Richard Mabey
Info:London : Century, 1986
Collections:Nonfiction
Rating:
Tags:gilbert white, history of science

Work Information

Gilbert White by Richard Mabey (1986)

None
Loading...

Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book.

No current Talk conversations about this book.

English nature writer Richard Mabey's eponymous biography Gilbert White was first published in 1986 by Century Hutchinson Ltd., and is now available in a first American edition from the University of Virginia Press. The book won the Whitbread Prize for Biography; not a bad choice, I think.

The Natural History of Selborne, White's magnum opus (now in more than two hundred editions, the jacket of Mabey's book informs) is one of the best-known and remarkable pieces of environmental/nature writing ever written. But until Mabey's, there was no full-length biography of its author. That, a true shame, has been well-corrected here. Mabey outlines White's life in Selborne (and, briefly, beyond) carefully, but concentrates on the long process through which White emerged as a chronicler of the world around him. An idiosyncratic and not-entirely-deliberate chronicler, to be sure, but an acute observer of the "links between humans and other creatures, a celebration of the life of a whole community."

White was fascinated by the actions of birds, particularly the swallows and swifts which frequented the vicinity of Selborne. Anyone who's ever spent any time watching that group knows how entirely engaging their antics are - it's hardly a surprise that White was entranced by them and spent much time tracking their movements and working to solve the perennial question of his day - did they migrate, or hibernate over the winter? White's writings on swallows (which Mabey calls the "high point of his prose") are well characterized here, and receive a fair treatment as compared with the Natural History, which usually gets all the attention.

A fine and readable (not to mention well-researched) biography of White; it's good to see this will be easily available here in the States now.

http://philobiblos.blogspot.com/2007/03/book-review-gilbert-white.html ( )
  JBD1 | Mar 15, 2007 |
no reviews | add a review
You must log in to edit Common Knowledge data.
For more help see the Common Knowledge help page.
Canonical title
Original title
Alternative titles
Original publication date
People/Characters
Important places
Important events
Related movies
Epigraph
Dedication
To Ronald Blythe and Charles Clark
First words
Quotations
Last words
Disambiguation notice
Publisher's editors
Blurbers
Original language
Canonical DDC/MDS
Canonical LCC

References to this work on external resources.

Wikipedia in English (3)

This is the award winning biography of the great naturalist Gilbert White (1720-93). When he wrote The Natural History of Selborne, he created one of the greatest and most influential natural history works of all time, his detailed observations providing the cornerstones to modern ecology.

No library descriptions found.

Book description
Haiku summary

Current Discussions

None

Popular covers

Quick Links

Rating

Average: (4.1)
0.5
1
1.5
2
2.5
3 1
3.5
4 6
4.5 2
5 1

Is this you?

Become a LibraryThing Author.

 

About | Contact | Privacy/Terms | Help/FAQs | Blog | Store | APIs | TinyCat | Legacy Libraries | Early Reviewers | Common Knowledge | 203,186,018 books! | Top bar: Always visible