Showing titles in Environmentalists & Naturalists

In 1990, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released its first Assessment Report. By then, award-winning urban planner Wendy Sarkissian had been singing the climate blues for years. Her colleagues dismiss her fears, so she abandons urban life for a solitary retreat to reconsider her professional and activist directions. With no bush skills, this terrified novice confronts many challenges during her harsh, year-long adventure in the Australian outback. As weeks pass, however, she discovers wellsprings of courage.

Following his retirement from academic life, renowned naturalist and writer Whit Gibbons and his family purchased a tract of abandoned farmland where the South Carolina piedmont meets the coastal plain. Described as backcountry scrubland, it was originally envisioned as a family retreat, but soon the property became Gibbons's outdoor learning laboratory where he was often aided by his four grandchildren, along with a host of enthusiastic visitors.

Jane Goodall, a naturalista mais célebre do mundo, e o escritor Douglas Abrams tratam de uma característica humana fundamental para enfrentar as adversidades: a esperança. Com a sabedoria de quem dedicou a vida à natureza, Jane explica por que, apesar da crise climática, da perda de biodiversidade e das turbulências políticas, ainda acredita na humanidade e na construção de um mundo melhor. Ela nos apresenta quatro razões para mantermos essa chama viva dentro de nós: o maravilhoso intelecto humano, a resiliência da natureza, o poder dos jovens e o indômito espírito humano.

In the spring of 1983 Terry Tempest Williams learned that her mother was dying of cancer. That same season, The Great Salt Lake began to rise to record heights, threatening the Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge and the herons, owls, and snowy egrets that Williams, a poet and naturalist, had come to gauge her life by. One event was nature at its most random, the other a by-product of rogue technology: Terry's mother, and Terry herself, had been exposed to the fallout of atomic bomb tests in the 1950s.

Madhav Gadgil was born in Pune in 1942, just as Salim Ali's superbly illustrated Book of Indian Birds was published. Influenced by his birdwatcher father, he learnt to recognize birds from their pictures even before he could read. He is an unusual combination of a person fascinated by the diversity of the natural world, of the landscapes and the life they support, as well as the diversity of cultures and lifestyles of the people firmly rooted to India's soil. He has dedicated himself to intellectual pursuits ranging over mathematics, natural and social sciences, history and public policy.

More than any other individual, James Stevenson-Hamilton can be credited with the creation of the Kruger National Park in South Africa. In 1902, when the South African War ended, Stevenson-Hamilton swapped his military career for the more uncertain calling of a game warden. Under his supervision the small, neglected and war-ravaged Sabi Game Reserve expanded in stature and size. By the time he retired in 1946, the Kruger National Park had become one of the great national parks of the world.

Meine Fragen an das Leben: "Dies ist kein Ratgeber, sondern eine Auseinandersetzung mit mir und meiner Beziehung zur Natur. Es geht um meine Lust am Leben und meine Überforderung in anspruchsvollen Zeiten. Ich erzähle von dem, was mich umtreibt, was mich aufbaut, meinen Sehnsüchten. Ich erzähle von entscheidenden Stationen meines Lebens und den Fragen, die ich habe: Was ist mir wichtig? Wie schöpfe ich Kraft? Was bedeutet anständiges Verhalten im Hier und Jetzt? Wie versuche ich, auf mich, andere und die Natur achtzugeben und zugleich lustvoll durch die Welt zu navigieren? Ich möchte in diesem Buch das Leben feiern."