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Almost 300 editions and reissues of The Natural History of Selborne
testify to its the lasting and universal appeal, but none before
has been so beautifully and fittingly illustrated. Gilbert White's
painstaking study of the fauna and flora of his native parish,
Selborne in Hampshire, first appeared in 1789 and has delighted and
inspired generations of readers ever since. His regular
correspondence, beginning in 1767, with two distinguished
naturalists forms the basis of The Natural History of Selborne,
which was published in the form of his letters to them. The
fascination of the book lies in the magic of its prose and the
vividness of its description, which have earned it the distinction
of being the only work on natural history to have received equal
acclaim as a masterpiece of English literature. To complement the
text, 124 colour plates have been faithfully reproduced from the
hand-coloured engravings of Gilbert White's contemporaries, giving
an invaluable extra dimension to this most captivating of books.
'I was much entertained last summer with a tame bat, which would
take flies out of a person's hand.' Gilbert White's Natural History
of Selborne (1789) reveals a world of wonders in nature. Over a
period of twenty years White describes in minute detail the
behaviour of animals through the changing seasons in the rural
Hampshire parish of Selborne. He notes everything from the habits
of an eccentric tortoise to the mysteries of bird migration and
animal reproduction, with the purpose of inspiring others to
observe their own surroundings with the same pleasure and
attention. Written as a series of letters, White's book has all the
immediacy of an exchange with friends, yet it is crafted with
compelling literary skill. His gossipy correspondence has delighted
readers from Charles Darwin to Virginia Woolf, and it has been read
as a nostalgic evocation of a pastoral vision, a model for local
studies of plants and animals, and a precursor to modern ecology.
This new edition includes contemporary illustrations, a
contextualizing introduction, and an appendix of literary responses
to the book. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World's
Classics has made available the widest range of literature from
around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's
commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a
wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions
by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text,
up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.
A century before Charles Darwin, decades before the French
Revolution, Gilbert White began his lifelong habit of measuring and
observing the world around his Hampshire home. Daily rainfall
levels and temperature shifts were recorded with home-made
instruments. Bird song and seasonal migrations were noted. The
feeding habits of frogs, bats and mice were jotted into his diaries
and nature journals, as were the simple delights he felt hearing a
cricket in the meadow or a blackbird in the hedgerows. The
extraordinary detail of the natural history he described has given
us, two hundred years later, a glimpse into ecosystems untouched by
industry and an account of how changes in global climate can affect
local weather patterns. Gilbert White is now considered England's
first ecologist. The Natural History of Selborne is one the most
published books in the English language. Yet the most enduring
quality of his writing is the spirit of curiosity that bounds
across every page, inspiring us to explore the abundance of life at
our doorsteps and around our parishes.
Gilbert White's Natural History of Selborne (1789) reveals a world
of wonders in nature. Over a period of twenty years White describes
in minute detail the behaviour of animals through the changing
seasons in the rural Hampshire parish of Selborne. He notes
everything from the habits of an eccentric tortoise to the
mysteries of bird migration and animal reproduction, with the
purpose of inspiring others to observe their own surroundings with
the same pleasure and attention. Written as a series of letters,
White's book has all the immediacy and freshness of an exchange
with friends, yet it is none the less crafted with compelling
literary skill. His gossipy correspondence has delighted readers
from Charles Darwin to Virginia Woolf, and it has been read as a
nostalgic evocation of a pastoral vision, a model for local studies
of plants and animals, and a precursor to modern ecology. This new
edition includes contemporary illustrations and an introduction
setting the work in its eighteenth-century context, as well as an
appendix tracking the remarkable range of responses to the work
over the last two hundred years.
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