| The Boilerplate Rhino: Nature in the Eye of the Beholder Contributor(s): Quammen, David (Author) |
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ISBN: 0743200322 ISBN-13: 9780743200325 Publisher: Scribner Book Company OUR PRICE: $16.20 Product Type: Paperback - Other Formats Published: April 2001 Annotation: From 1981 to 1996, Quammen recounted personal tales of adventure and wry observations in his popular "Natural Acts" column in "Outside" magazine. "The Boilerplate Rhino" brings together 25 of his best pieces, offering readers the opportunity to behold the quirks of both human and nature through the eyes of a masterful storyteller. |
| Additional Information |
| BISAC Categories: - Nature | Essays - Nature | Animals - Wildlife |
| Dewey: 508 |
| Series: Nature in the Eye of the Beholder |
| Physical Information: 0.68" H x 5.48" W x 8.45" (0.56 lbs) 288 pages |
| Descriptions, Reviews, Etc. |
| Publisher Description: In 1981 David Quammen began what might be every freelance writer's dream: a monthly column for Outside magazine in which he was given free rein to write about anything that interested him in the natural world. His column was called Natural Acts, and for the next fifteen years he delighted Outside's readers with his fascinating ruminations on the world around us. The Boilerplate Rhino brings together twenty-six of Quammen's most thoughtful and engaging essays from that column, none previously printed in any of his earlier books. In lucid, penetrating, and often quirkily idiosyncratic prose, David Quammen takes his readers with him as he explores the world. His travels lead him to rattlesnake handlers in Texas; a lizard specialist in Baja; the dinosaur museum in Jordan, Montana; and halfway across Indonesia in search of the perfect Durian fruit. He ponders the history of nutmeg in the southern Moluccas, meditates on bioluminescent beetles while soaking in the waters of the Amazon, and delivers The Dope on Eggs from a chicken ranch near his hometown in Montana. Quammen's travels are always jumping-off points to explore the rich and sometimes horrifying tension between humankind and the natural world, in all its complexity and ambivalence. The result is another irrepressible assortment of ideas to explore, conundrums to contemplate, and wondrous creatures to behold. |
Contributor Bio(s): Quammen, David: - David Quammen's fifteen books include The Tangled Tree, The Song of the Dodo, The Reluctant Mr. Darwin, and Spillover, a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle award. He has written for Harper's, The Atlantic, Rolling Stone, The New York Times Book Review, Outside, and Powder, among other magazines, and is a contributing writer for National Geographic. He wrote the entire text of the May 2016 issue of National Geographic on the Greater Yellowstone ecosystem--the first time in the history of the magazine that an issue was single-authored. Quammen shares a home in Bozeman, Montana, with his wife, Betsy Gaines Quammen, an environmental historian, along with two Russian wolfhounds and a cross-eyed cat. Visit him at DavidQuammen.com. |