The Underworld: Journeys to the Depths of the Ocean
Rate it:
Open Preview
Kindle Notes & Highlights
4%
Flag icon
The idea of a descent into anything unnerves us. We descend into madness, into grief, into chaos. We fall into disrepute, fall from grace, and even worse, fall into oblivion.
6%
Flag icon
The biologist Edward O. Wilson summed it up in a sentence: “Even the deadliest and most repugnant creatures bring an endowment of magic to the human mind.”
9%
Flag icon
Any marine scientist examining it now would recognize it as a hexactinellid, or glass sponge—an intriguing, primitive animal that can live for more than ten thousand years.
13%
Flag icon
William Beebe wanted to go first. He was a guy who loved birds, jungles, cocktails, expeditions, costume parties, museums, marine life, writing, science, and women—and not necessarily in that order.