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Library of America #286
Collected Essays on Evolution, Nature, and the Cosmos, Vol. 2: The Invisible Pyramid / The Night Country / Essays from The Star Thrower
The second volume of The Library of America’s landmark collection of Loren Eiseley’s essays opens with The Invisible Pyramid (1970), a book of meditations on the origins and possible futures of humankind set against the backdrop of the Apollo 11 landing. As Western civilization attains new heights of scientific awareness and technological skill, is it also blind to its own limits, doomed to destroy itself like the lost civilizations of the ancients or other “spore-bearers” in our evolutionary past? Eiseley makes an urgent, environmentalist plea in these essays: we must protect the planet from which we emerged against our unchecked power to overpopulate and pollute and consume it.
The essays in The Night Country (1971) look not to the stars but backward and inward: to the haunted spaces of Eiseley’s lonely Nebraska childhood and to those moments, often dark and unexpected, when chance observations disturb our ordinary understandings of the universe. The naturalist here seeks neither “salvation in facts” nor solace in wild places: encountering an old bone, or a nest of wasps, he recognizes what he calls “the ghostliness of myself,” his own mortality, and the paradoxes of the evolution of consciousness.
Shortly before his death, Eiseley made plans for what would be his last book, published posthumously as The Star Thrower (1978). Here are late essays on the life and legacy of Henry David Thoreau, the writer to whom he turned more often than any other; thoughts on the “two cultures” he sought to bring together throughout his career; and on the relations between hard science and “awe before the universe.” Of particular interest are two early stories discovered among his papers, “The Dance of the Frogs” and “The Fifth Planet.”
The essays in The Night Country (1971) look not to the stars but backward and inward: to the haunted spaces of Eiseley’s lonely Nebraska childhood and to those moments, often dark and unexpected, when chance observations disturb our ordinary understandings of the universe. The naturalist here seeks neither “salvation in facts” nor solace in wild places: encountering an old bone, or a nest of wasps, he recognizes what he calls “the ghostliness of myself,” his own mortality, and the paradoxes of the evolution of consciousness.
Shortly before his death, Eiseley made plans for what would be his last book, published posthumously as The Star Thrower (1978). Here are late essays on the life and legacy of Henry David Thoreau, the writer to whom he turned more often than any other; thoughts on the “two cultures” he sought to bring together throughout his career; and on the relations between hard science and “awe before the universe.” Of particular interest are two early stories discovered among his papers, “The Dance of the Frogs” and “The Fifth Planet.”
489 pages, Hardcover
Published November 15, 2016
About the author
Loren Eiseley
50 books321 followersLoren Corey Eiseley (September 3, 1907 – July 9, 1977) was a highly respected anthropologist, science writer, ecologist, and poet. He published books of essays, biography, and general science in the 1950s through the 1970s.
Eiseley is best known for the poetic essay style, called the "concealed essay". He used this to explain complex scientific ideas, such as human evolution, to the general public. He is also known for his writings about humanity's relationship with the natural world; these writings helped inspire the modern environmental movement.
Eiseley is best known for the poetic essay style, called the "concealed essay". He used this to explain complex scientific ideas, such as human evolution, to the general public. He is also known for his writings about humanity's relationship with the natural world; these writings helped inspire the modern environmental movement.
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January 13, 2024"We are in the center of the storm and we have lost our sense of direction." - Loren Eiseley
"Man will never find the end of the trail." Dr Robert Hofstadter, Nobel Prize winner in Physics
I was of two minds in my anticipation of reading this second volume of Eiseley's collected essays. Emotionally raw and searching for meaning in a world quickly resembling an overdone science fiction angle, I had voraciously devoured and swooned over his first volume in the early pandemic months of 2020, especially the chapter on The Judgment of the Birds, which had me in a purifying puddle of tears; I was hesitant to follow that up with what may turn out to be a mediocre selection by a writer I had come to lionize. Then again, perhaps the polar spectrum may have been apprehension--would this second volume have as cathartic an effect, with the soul-searching ramifications that come with it? Because reading Eiseley does that to you. Especially when applying his misgivings, his disquieting prescience on modern warfare and galloping, unshackled technology in the context of today's precarious peace and mind-blowing AI.
While no misanthrope, Eiseley craved the solitary, carving a path which echoes Charles Darwin, who was quoted, after travelling in the Andean uplands with illiterate companions, as saying "The whole of my pleasure was derived from what passed in my mind." Such can be the exquisite arrogance of a brilliant, highly evolved, eloquent mind. And yet Eiseley could just as easily gravitate to the elemental, sharing some very unforgettable anecdotes with some of the most intriguing characters in non-fiction (as I understood it to be), foremost among them the gentleman who professed, one fleeting spring evening, to have hopped with frogs the size of humans (one Albert Dreyer, in The Dance of the Frogs).
Loren Eiseley, contradictory man of science, had a penchant for seeking the transcendent in nature, shadowing meandering trails, arroyos, canyons, marshland, and the thought process, the mind print of his earlier incarnation, Henry David Thoreau. He can write about the most mundane subjects: resourceful field mice, prehensile-tailed spider monkeys, a flint--early man's tool du jour--and realize your thoughts are still captive to his days, even years after reading it. Best of all, he challenges his readers to question, and ponder outside the box by occasionally throwing us an epiphanic curve ball. For instance, is man a product of evolution, and is in fact, still evolving? Or are we the remnants of a superior species which, over centuries, has degenerated to the present, desperately flawed specimen? Simply put, are we descended from apes or the demigods of Atlantis? And what of the tenuous relationship between nature and human nature, which will eventually prevail? Eiseley doesn't paint a very optimistic picture, but humanity, it seems, will triumph. Barely.
Verdict: This second volume is every bit as evocative and powerful as the first.
"Man will never find the end of the trail." Dr Robert Hofstadter, Nobel Prize winner in Physics
I was of two minds in my anticipation of reading this second volume of Eiseley's collected essays. Emotionally raw and searching for meaning in a world quickly resembling an overdone science fiction angle, I had voraciously devoured and swooned over his first volume in the early pandemic months of 2020, especially the chapter on The Judgment of the Birds, which had me in a purifying puddle of tears; I was hesitant to follow that up with what may turn out to be a mediocre selection by a writer I had come to lionize. Then again, perhaps the polar spectrum may have been apprehension--would this second volume have as cathartic an effect, with the soul-searching ramifications that come with it? Because reading Eiseley does that to you. Especially when applying his misgivings, his disquieting prescience on modern warfare and galloping, unshackled technology in the context of today's precarious peace and mind-blowing AI.
While no misanthrope, Eiseley craved the solitary, carving a path which echoes Charles Darwin, who was quoted, after travelling in the Andean uplands with illiterate companions, as saying "The whole of my pleasure was derived from what passed in my mind." Such can be the exquisite arrogance of a brilliant, highly evolved, eloquent mind. And yet Eiseley could just as easily gravitate to the elemental, sharing some very unforgettable anecdotes with some of the most intriguing characters in non-fiction (as I understood it to be), foremost among them the gentleman who professed, one fleeting spring evening, to have hopped with frogs the size of humans (one Albert Dreyer, in The Dance of the Frogs).
Loren Eiseley, contradictory man of science, had a penchant for seeking the transcendent in nature, shadowing meandering trails, arroyos, canyons, marshland, and the thought process, the mind print of his earlier incarnation, Henry David Thoreau. He can write about the most mundane subjects: resourceful field mice, prehensile-tailed spider monkeys, a flint--early man's tool du jour--and realize your thoughts are still captive to his days, even years after reading it. Best of all, he challenges his readers to question, and ponder outside the box by occasionally throwing us an epiphanic curve ball. For instance, is man a product of evolution, and is in fact, still evolving? Or are we the remnants of a superior species which, over centuries, has degenerated to the present, desperately flawed specimen? Simply put, are we descended from apes or the demigods of Atlantis? And what of the tenuous relationship between nature and human nature, which will eventually prevail? Eiseley doesn't paint a very optimistic picture, but humanity, it seems, will triumph. Barely.
Verdict: This second volume is every bit as evocative and powerful as the first.
November 2, 2019
I've read thousands of books in my life. I'll have to say right here and now that reading Eiseley was impressive. I was reading library loaners (vol. 1 and 2) of this series, but I will most definitely be buying my own copies to cherish. This man was special. His writing is deep, meaningful, and heartfelt. He was a paleontologist/anthropologist by trade, but in his heart he was a philosopher poet. Don't miss this. It will have an affect on you and your life to read this man's thoughts.
February 10, 2017
Back in the 60's, before Carl Sagan, there was Loren Eiseley. It is nice to have his work back in print. His essays are worth the time and effort. You come away with a sense of man's place in the cosmos that haunts us all.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews