A Year with Gilbert White: The First Great Nature Writer

A BOOK OF THE YEAR IN THE TIMES (UK), THE SPECTATOR, FINANCIAL TIMES, OBSERVER, AND NEW STATESMAN

From one of the most inquiring and celebrated biographers, a glimpse into the life and mind of a pioneering naturalist. In 1781, Gilbert White was a country curate living in the Hampshire village he had known all his life. Fascinated by the fauna, flora, and people around him, he had kept journals for many years and was halfway to completing his pathbreaking work The Natural History of Selborne. No one had written like this before, with such close observation, humor, and sympathy; his spellbinding book has remained in print ever since, treasured by generations of readers.

Jenny Uglow illuminates this quirky, warmhearted man, "the father of ecology," by following a single year in his Naturalist's Journal. As his diary jumps from topic to topic, she accompanies Gilbert from frost to summer drought, from the migration of birds to the sex lives of snails and the coming of harvest.

Fresh, alive, and original--and packed with rich color illustrations--A Year with Gilbert White invites us to see the natural world anew, with astonishment and wonder.