A Primate's Memoir (Thorndike Press Large Print Adventure Series) - Hardcover

Sapolsky, Robert M.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0786234326 ISBN 13: 9780786234325

Publisher: Thorndike Pr, 2001

Synopsis

In the tradition of Jane Goodall and Dian Fossey, Robert Sapolsky, a foremost science writer and recipient of a MacArthur Genius Grant, tells the mesmerizing story of his twenty-one years in remote Kenya with a troop of Savannah baboons. "I had never planned to become a savanna baboon when I grew up; instead, I had always assumed I would become a mountain gorilla," writes Robert Sapolsky in this witty and riveting chronicle of a scientist's coming-of-age in remote Africa. An exhilarating account of Sapolsky's twenty-one-year study of a troop of rambunctious baboons in Kenya, A Primate's Memoir interweaves serious scientific observations with wry commentary about the challenges and pleasures of living in the wilds of the Serengeti--for man and beast alike. Over two decades, Sapolsky survives culinary atrocities, gunpoint encounters, and a surreal kidnapping, while witnessing the encroachment of the tourist mentality on the farthest vestiges of unspoiled Africa. As he conducts unprecedented physiological research on wild primates, he becomes evermore enamored of his subjects--unique and compelling characters in their own right--and he returns to them summer after summer, until tragedy finally prevents him. By turns hilarious and poignant, A Primate's Memoir is a magnum opus from one of our foremost science writers.

About this title

Review:

Rob Nixon

"The New York Times Book Review"

"A Primate's Memoir" is the closest the baboon is likely to come...to having its own Iliad.

Susan Salter Reynolds

"Los Angeles Times"

Sapolsky has a huge appetite for life...He writes exactly as if he's telling stories around a fire in the bush.

Lynn Yarris

"Newsday"

"A Primate's Memoir" flies along like a well-paced and finely crafted novel...[giving] us a cast of characters as memorably colorful as any that Dickens ever created.

Rob Nixon"The New York Times Book Review""A Primate's Memoir" is the closest the baboon is likely to come...to having its own Iliad.

Susan Salter Reynolds"Los Angeles Times"Sapolsky has a huge appetite for life...He writes exactly as if he's telling stories around a fire in the bush.

Lynn Yarris"Newsday""A Primate's Memoir" flies along like a well-paced and finely crafted novel...[giving] us a cast of characters as memorably colorful as any that Dickens ever created.

Rob Nixon "The New York Times Book Review""A Primate's Memoir" is the closest the baboon is likely to come...to having its own Iliad.

Lynn Yarris "Newsday""A Primate's Memoir" flies along like a well-paced and finely crafted novel...[giving] us a cast of characters as memorably colorful as any that Dickens ever created.

Susan Salter Reynolds "Los Angeles Times" Sapolsky has a huge appetite for life...He writes exactly as if he's telling stories around a fire in the bush.

Rob Nixon "The New York Times Book Review" "A Primate's Memoir" is the closest the baboon is likely to come...to having its own Iliad.

Book Description:

One of the world's leading primatologists reinvents the traditional field research study with this exhilarating, hilarious and daring memoir of twenty-plus years studying a troop of baboons in Kenya.

About this edition

• Publisher: Thorndike Pr
• Publication date: 2001
• ISBN 10: 0786234326
• ISBN 13: 9780786234325
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 621