Loren Eiseley

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Loren Corey Eiseley (September 3, 1907–July 9, 1977) was a highly respected anthropologist, science writer, ecologist, and poet who published books of essays, biography, and general science in the 1950s, '60s, and '70s. He is best known for the poetic essay style, called the "hidden essay," which he used to explain complex scientific ideas, such as human evolution, to the general public. He is also known for his writings about humanity's relationship with the natural world, which helped inspire the environmental movement. Among his books are The Immense Journey (1957), Darwin's Century (1958), The Unexpected Universe (1969), The Night Country (1971), and the memoir All the Strange Hours (1975).

Contents 1 Early life 2 Academic career 3 Writings 4 Death and Burial 5 Bibliography 5.1 Scientific essays and books on the history of science 5.2 Memoir 5.3 Poetry 6 References 7 External links

[edit] Early life

Born in Lincoln, Nebraska, Eiseley lived a hard childhood with a distant father and deaf mother who suffered from possible mental illness. After his father's death, he dropped out of high school and worked various jobs before enrolling in the University of Nebraska, where he also worked as an archaeologist.

Diagnosed with tuberculosis in 1933, Eiseley left the university and moved to the western United States desert, believing the air would improve his condition. However, he was restless and unhappy and eventually began hoboing around the country, riding freight trains (as many others did during the Great Depression). Eiseley later described these travels in All the Strange Hours, which many critics consider to be his masterpiece.

[edit] Academic career

Eiseley eventually returned to the University of Nebraska and received his Bachelor of Science in English and Geology/Anthropology. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania in 1937 and began teaching at the University of Kansas that same year. During World War II, Eiseley taught anatomy to reservist pre-med students at Kansas.

In 1944 he left the University of Kansas to assume the role of head of the Department of Sociology, and Anthropology at Oberlin College in Ohio.

In 1947 he returned to Pennsylvania as head of the Anthropology Department. He was elected president of the American Institute of Human Paleontology in 1949. From 1959 to 1961, he was provost at the University of Pennsylvania.

In 1961 the University of Pennsylvania created a special interdisciplinary chairmanship for him. In the same year he accepted a fellowship at Stanford University in California in the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences. After a year at Stanford, he returned to his chairmanship in Pennsylvania, later named the Benjamin Franklin Professorship.

[edit] Writings

In addition to his scientific and academic work, in the mid 1940s Eiseley began to publish the essays which brought him to the attention of a wider audience. His first book, The Immense Journey, a collection of writings about the history of humanity, was published in 1957, and was the rare science book to appeal to a mass audience. His book Darwin’s Century won the Phi Beta Kappa prize for best book in science in 1958.

The hallmark of Eiseley's writing was to combine scientific explorations with a deep sense of humanism and poetry. Instead of simply seeing the world as a set of scientific facts and figures, Eiseley used science to look for the deeper meaning of life, even while freely admitting that science could not answer all of the mysteries of existence. This led to Eiseley's recasting of the term magician from the merely metaphysical to that of the creative Muse.

[edit] Death and Burial

Loren Eiseley died on July 9, 1977, and was buried in West Laurel Hill Cemetery in Bala Cynwyd, Pennsylvania. This is a rural cemetery and a "sister" institution to the more famous Laurel Hill Cemetery nearby. Eiseley's wife, Mabel Langdon Eiseley, died on July 27, 1986, and is buried next to him, in the Westlawn section of the cemetery, in Lot 366. The inscription on their headstone reads, "We loved the earth but could not stay", which is a line from his poem The Little Treasures.

A library in the Lincoln City Libraries public library system is named after Eiseley.

[edit] Bibliography

[edit] Scientific essays and books on the history of science

• Charles Darwin, (1956, W.H. Freeman)
• The Immense Journey: An Imaginative Naturalist Explores the Mysteries of Man and Nature (1957, Vintage Books, Random House ISBN 0-394-70157-7). The first and most widely read collection of Eiseley's essays, with a million copies in print
• Darwin's Century (1958, Doubleday). Focuses on the development of the theory of evolution. Awarded the Phi Beta Kappa Science prize in 1959.
• The Firmament of Time (1960, Atheneum, University of Nebraska Press reissue 1999: ISBN 0-8032-6739-8). Awarded the 1961 John Burroughs Medal for the best publication in the field of Nature Writing
• Frances Bacon and the Modern Dilemma (1961, Scribner, 1972 revised edition pub. as The Man Who Saw Through Time: ISBN 0-684-13285-0, Peter Smith Publications 1983 reprint: ISBN 0-8446-5979-7)
• The Mind as Nature (1962, Harper and Row)
• Man, Time, and Prophecy, (1966, Harcourt, Brace & World)
• The Unexpected Universe (1969, Harcourt, Brace and World ISBN 0-15-692850-7)
• The Invisible Pyramid: A Naturalist Analyses the Rocket Century (1971, Devin-Adair Pub: ISBN 0-8159-5831-5, Scribner 1985 paperback: ISBN 0-684-12732-6, Reissued by Nebraska Press, 1998 ISBN 0-8032-6738-X)
• The Night Country: Reflections of a Bone-Hunting Man (1971, Scribner: ISBN 0684125684 , paperback: ISBN 0803267355 , Reissued by Nebraska Press, 1997: ISBN 0-8032-6735-5)
• Another Kind of Autumn (1977, Scribner ISBN 0-684-15138-3, Encore Editions: ISBN 0-684-16352-7)
• The Star Thrower (1978, Times Books (Random House) hardcover: ISBN 0-8129-0746-9, 1979 Harvest/HBJ paperback: ISBN 0-15-684909-7, Sagebrush library/school binding: ISBN 1-4176-1867-1); introduction by W. H. Auden
• Darwin and the Mysterious Mr. X: New Light on the Evolutionists (1979, E.P. Dutton, Harvest HBJ 1981: ISBN 0-15-623949-3)
• The Lost Notebooks of Loren Eiseley, Kenneth Heuer editor, (1987, Little Brown & Co: ISBN 0-316-35921-1, 1991 paperback: ISBN 0-316-35923-8, 2002, University of Nebraska Press, ISBN 0-8032-6747-9) Includes letters from W.H. Auden and Ray Bradbury
• How Flowers Changed the World, photographs by Gerald Ackerman. (1996, Random House: ISBN 0-87156-889-6) The essay from The Immense Journey is accompanied by photographs of flowers.

[edit] Memoir

• All The Strange Hours: The Excavation of a Life (1975, Scribner, University of Nebraska Press 2000 reissue: ISBN 0-8032-6741-X).

[edit] Poetry

• Notes of an Alchemist (1972, Scribner, McMillan 1978 reissue: ISBN 0-684-13693-7).
• The Innocent Assassins (1973, Scribner ISBN 0-684-13525-6).
• All The Night Wings (1978, Times Books ISBN 0-8129-0838-4).

[edit] References

• Angyal, Andrew J., Loren Eiseley (Boston, MA : G. K. Hall & Co., 1983). ISBN 0-8057-7381-9
• Christianson, Gale E., Fox at the Wood's Edge: A Biography of Loren Eiseley. H.Holt Brown, 1990, University of Nebraska Press 2000 reissue: ISBN 0-8032-6410-0
• Eiseley, Loren, All The Strange Hours: The Excavation of a Life. Scribner, 1975.
• Gerber, Leslie E. and Margaret McFadden, Loren Eiseley (New York : Frederick Ungar Publishing Co., 1983). ISBN 0-8044-5424-8

[edit] External links

• Online collection of Eiseley's essays and poetry. (signup required)
• Official website of the Friends of Loren Eiseley (FOLE) Society
• Returning Insight to Storytelling: Science, Stories, and Loren Eiseley An essay exploring Eiseley's memoir All The Strange Hours: The Excavation of a Life.
• Review of All The Strange Hours
• The Man from the Sunflower Forest: A Loren Eiseley Reader
• Searching for Loren Eiseley: An Attempt at Reconstruction from a Few Fragments
• NET Television