Lost Woods : The Discovered Writing of Rachel Carson

Amazon.com Review In her lifetime, Rachel Carson published only four books. She was a careful writer and meticulous researcher, for one thing, and she worked as a government scientist until the success of books like Silent Spring and The Sea Around Us enabled her to turn to her own writing full-time. She also published several magazine pieces, many of which biographer Linda Lear gathers here, along with letters and journal entries. In one piece that is characteristic both of her modesty and of her wit, Carson remarks on her then-unusual status of being an "average-sized woman" and a scientist, one who had just become "a biographer of the sea." In another, Carson writes of the necessity of protecting shorelines from economic development that would hasten their erosion and subsequent destruction. Carson's many fans will take much pleasure in this anthology of her work. --Gregory McNamee From Publishers Weekly If fleeting sketches can sometimes say more than the fully realized work, this collection of journal entries, a TV script, speeches and articles by one of the pioneers of the modern environmental movement gracefully delivers. Pieces on the destruction of unique island eco-systems, the connection of music to nature and environmental "managed care" of waterfowl refuges offer sad testament to Carson's range, never to be further explored due to her early death from breast cancer, in 1964. Written with mesmeric intensity, Carson's first piece of published adult work, "Undersea," was accepted by the Atlantic in 1935. Reprinted here, it reveals her lasting obsession not only with the sea but with the antiquity and majestic continuity of life on earth. Her other famous passion, exposing the ravaging effects of pesticides, which was devastatingly depicted in her 1962 classic, Silent Spring, is defended here in a speech that marks the maturity of her voice. Highly informed and occasionally withering, this refutation of her big-business critics reveals the nasty arena she felt forced to enter. In other speeches, Carson, a trained biologist, laments the perceived distance between science and a language that can touch nonscientific people. For a TV script on the subject of clouds, she states, in a delicate synthesis of fact and poetry, "They are the writing of the wind on the sky." The careful gathering of fragments by Lear (author of the 1997 biography Rachel Carson), if presented a little too reverently, gives rare glimpses of Carson's personal vulnerability and of her strange fusion of restraint and fervor, offering a frequent sense of being in Carson's company. Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc. Here Is A Trove Of Carson Writing Never Before Published Or Collected, Uncovered By Linda Lear, Author Of The Recent And Acclaimed Rachel Carson: Witness For Nature. Included Are Examples Of Her Early And Often Remarkable Nature Writing For Newspapers And For The Fish And Wildlife Service; Journal Observations On Shore Life; Letters, Including The Lost Woods Correspondence Concerning Her Efforts To Save Land In Her Beloved Maine, And Another, Written To Her Physician Near The End Of Her Life, That Reveals Carson's Fight To Be Told The Truth About Her Cancer Even As She Was Working To Expose The Hazards Of Pesticides. Lost Woods Also Creates A Vivid Record Of Carson's Activism. In Talks To National Groups, She Gives Astute Early Criticism Of The Ties Between Universities And Chemical Manufacturers, And Skewers Her Critics With Still-timely Precision.--jacket. Ch. 1. Undersea -- Ch. 2. My Favorite Recreation -- Ch. 3. Fight For Wildlife Pushes Ahead/chesapeake Eels Seek The Sargasso Sea -- Ch. 4. Ace Of Nature's Aviators -- Ch. 5. Road Of The Hawks -- Ch. 6. Island I Remember -- Ch. 7. Mattamuskeet: A National Wildlife Refuge -- Ch. 8. Memo To Mrs. Eales On Under The Sea-wind -- Ch. 9. Lost Worlds: The Challenge Of The Islands -- Ch. 10. New York Herald-tribune Book And Author Luncheon Speech -- Ch. 11. Jacket Notes For The Rca Victor Recording Of Claude Debussy's La Mer/national Symphony Orchestra Speech -- Ch. 12. Remarks At The Acceptance Of The National Book Award For Nonfiction -- Ch. 13. Design For Nature Writing -- Ch. 14. Mr. Day's Dismissal -- Ch. 15. Preface To The Second Edition Of The Sea Around Us -- Ch. 16. Our Ever-changing Shore -- Ch. 17. Four Fragments From Carson's Field Notebooks -- Ch. 18. Edge Of The Sea -- Ch. 19. Real World Around Us -- Ch. 20. Biological Sciences -- Ch. 21. Two Letters To Dorothy And Stanley Freeman -- Ch. 22. Lost Woods: A Letter To Curtis And Nellie Lee Bok -- Ch. 23. Clouds -- Ch. 24. Vanishing Americans -- Ch. 25. To Understand Biology/preface To Animal Machines --ch. 26. Fable For Tomorrow -- Ch. 27. Women's National Press Club Speech -- Ch. 28. New Chapter To Silent Spring -- Ch. 29. Letter To Dr. George Crile, Jr. -- Ch. 30. Pollution Of Our Environment -- Ch. 31. Letter To Dorothy Freeman. Edited And With An Introduction By Linda Lear. Includes Index. Discover the previously uncollected works of Silent Spring author Rachel Carson—considered one of the best nature writers of the 20th century. “Lyric, descriptive, informative, and moving.” —The New York Times When Rachel Carson died of cancer in 1964, her four books, including the environmental classic Silent Spring, had made her one of the most famous people in America. This anthology of previously uncollected writings is a priceless addition to our knowledge of Rachel Carson, her affinity with the natural world, and her life. Featuring nature writing, speeches, field notebook passages, and letters, this collection is an invaluable insight to Carson's thought and philosophy and a treasure trove for environmentalists. When Rachel Carson died of cancer in 1964, her four books, including the environmental classic Silent Spring, had made her one of the most famous people in America. This trove of previously uncollected writings is a priceless addition to our knowledge of Rachel Carson, her affinity with the natural world, and her life.