Here too are literary qualities and aspirations that led many to hail Eiseley as a “modern Thoreau”: his quest for the ultimate meanings and cosmological significance of natural phenomena, along with his immense expressive gifts. Here are vivid accounts of prehistoric ecosystems, the origins of consciousness, the search for “living fossils” at the bottom of the sea, and the complexities of our evolutionary inheritance. This first volume begins with Eiseley’s debut collection, which displays his far-reaching knowledge and boundless curiosity about the mysteries of the natural world. After decades of fieldwork and discovery as a “bone-hunter” and professor, Eiseley turned late in life to the personal essay, and beginning with the surprise million-copy seller The Immense Journey (1957) he produced an astonishing succession of books that won acclaim both as science and as art. Now for the first time, the Library of America presents his landmark essay collections in a definitive two-volume set. There is an unstated but real gothic terror prowling behind his vision.An eminent paleontologist with the soul and skill of a poet, Loren Eiseley (1907–1977) was among the twentieth century’s greatest inheritors of the literary tradition of Henry David Thoreau, Charles Darwin, and John Muir, and a precursor to such later writers as Stephen Jay Gould, Richard Dawkins, and Carl Sagan. Eiseley is a master of significant anecdote. “A relentless, haunting, and haunted figure devils the man and twists from him some of the best prose we have. As Western civilization attains new heights of scientific awareness and technological skill, he asks, is it also blind to its own limits and destructive capacities? Always a fond observer of the natural world, Eiseley makes a newly urgent, environmentalist plea in The Invisible Pyramid: we must protect the fragile “world island” against our unchecked power to pollute and consume it. In this brilliant collection, he considers the cosmological significance and ultimate meanings of our evolutionary history, offering a series of profound, lyrical meditations on the origins and possible futures of humankind against the backdrop of the Apollo landings. To read Loren Eiseley is to renew a sense of wonder at the miracles and paradoxes of evolution and the ever-changing diversity of life. A revered ecologist and conservationist examines the origins and possible futures of humankind within the context of the Space Age, masterfully “ the awesome spectacle of our environmental crisis” ( New York Times Book Review)
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