The Unexpected Universe

Rating:
Summary: You cannot miss with Loren Eiseley
Review: I think every book this man ever wrote is a masterpiece. His style is thoughtful, haunting, and beautiful. They are all good. Theodosius Dobzhansky described him as "...a Proust miraculously turned into an evolutionary anthropologist..." and Ray Bradbury wrote glowing reviews of many of his books including this one.

Here he writes from a naturalist's perspective on the unexpected and symbloic aspects of the universe. Read about seeds, heiroglyphs on shells, the Ice Age, lost tombs, city dumps and primative Man. The underlying theme is the desolation and renewal of our planet's history and experience.

Rating:
Summary: Compassion--Our Last Great Hope
Review: Loren Eiseley's dark, brooding prose is unique in the annals of nature writing. "The Unexpected Universe" features some of what are considered Eiseley's best essays. Heavily autobiographical and deeply personal, these essays are not cheerful ramblings on the joy of communing with nature. They are bleak, lonely musings on the human condition. Sometimes, Eisely's scholarly style gets the best of him - his penchant for expounding upon the works of obscure authors taints some of his work with a pompous air. But his best moments more than make up for his bad ones. Eiseley's universe can be profound, ethereal, and dreamlike. Life, Eisely shows, is a journey of discovery filled with moments of awe, fear and sorrow, and occasionally, even with moments of joy. His writings rekindle our sense of wonder for a universe whose intricacies and secrets extend far beyond the boundaries of human understanding.

Rating:
Summary: Somber essays from an outstanding writer
Review: Loren Eiseley's dark, brooding prose is unique in the annals of nature writing. "The Unexpected Universe" features some of what are considered Eiseley's best essays. Heavily autobiographical and deeply personal, these essays are not cheerful ramblings on the joy of communing with nature. They are bleak, lonely musings on the human condition. Sometimes, Eisely's scholarly style gets the best of him - his penchant for expounding upon the works of obscure authors taints some of his work with a pompous air. But his best moments more than make up for his bad ones. Eiseley's universe can be profound, ethereal, and dreamlike. Life, Eisely shows, is a journey of discovery filled with moments of awe, fear and sorrow, and occasionally, even with moments of joy. His writings rekindle our sense of wonder for a universe whose intricacies and secrets extend far beyond the boundaries of human understanding.

Rating:
Summary: Somber essays from an outstanding writer
Review: Loren Eiseley's dark, brooding prose is unique in the annals of nature writing. "The Unexpected Universe" features some of what are considered Eiseley's best essays. Heavily autobiographical and deeply personal, these essays are not cheerful ramblings on the joy of communing with nature. They are bleak, lonely musings on the human condition. Sometimes, Eisely's scholarly style gets the best of him - his penchant for expounding upon the works of obscure authors taints some of his work with a pompous air. But his best moments more than make up for his bad ones. Eiseley's universe can be profound, ethereal, and dreamlike. Life, Eisely shows, is a journey of discovery filled with moments of awe, fear and sorrow, and occasionally, even with moments of joy. His writings rekindle our sense of wonder for a universe whose intricacies and secrets extend far beyond the boundaries of human understanding.

Rating:
Summary: Compassion--Our Last Great Hope
Review: The title of this review is from Leo Bustad, DVM, PhD. Please read the essay "The Star Thrower" for a wonderfully poetic discussion of what sets us apart from "animals" and what connects us. For anyone who has ever thought about how we should act in relation to other species, this essay will provide an intriguing viewpoint. For anyone who is a caregiver to animals, this essay is required reading. Throw away the rest of the book if you want, but you MUST read this essay!

Rating:
Summary: Compassion--Our Last Great Hope
Review: The title of this review is from Leo Bustad, DVM, PhD. Please read the essay "The Star Thrower" for a wonderfully poetic discussion of what sets us apart from "animals" and what connects us. For anyone who has ever thought about how we should act in relation to other species, this essay will provide an intriguing viewpoint. For anyone who is a caregiver to animals, this essay is required reading. Throw away the rest of the book if you want, but you MUST read this essay!

Rating:
Summary: Title is in appropriate
Review: There are some observations worthy of consideration and perhaps even remembering hence 1 star. It can be said that Loren Eiseley writes very well indeed, mostly about himself. This book goes far beyond being a "highly personal" book and comes very close to be an autobiography. If Mr. Eiseley intended to convince the reader that he had read a lot of books he succeeded. Whether or not he asimilated the information or just quotes from them is not so clear. He was not the first or only person to be intrigued by the so called alphabet shell but he is the only one, so far as I can determine, to assume it contained an important message from the universe. This man who sees messages of great import from the universe in a sea shell undertakes to explain both Darwin and Thoreau for the dolts of the world incapable of understanding what they read. I can see no other reason for him to explain so carefully what they meant by what they wrote. We are mighty beholden to him. Someone once said " Naturalists and Biologists are strange fellow or they would not be Naturalists and Bioligists". Even with that as a given it is hard to reconcile the personal observations of the Author with the Title of the book. He may have found them enthralling because they were his and feels everyone will be simply thrilled and dutifully impressed. All careful observers as they journey through life have seen as much or more but in the main they do not try to foist there observations or personal feelings on the public. A more appropriate title, I suspect, would have been, "I, Loren Eiseley". One thing can be said with certainty. He is really full of himself.