How Flowers Changed

by Loren Eiseley

This graceful essay on the pivotal role of flowers in human evolution is certain to delight those readers already familiar with Loren Eiseley and to find an audience among naturalists, gardeners, and... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0871568896
• ISBN13: 9780871568892
• Release Date: September 1996
• Publisher: Random House (NY)
• Length: 1 Pages
• Weight: 0.45 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.4" x 6.4" x 6.3"

Customer Reviews

How Flowers Changed the World

This is a beautiful little book with sumptuous photographs of flowers illustrating one of Eiseley's profound essays on an event central to the evolution of man, and generally overlooked. Reading Eiseley lets us into the company of a uniquely American, brilliantly thoughtful man who took his time, wry humor and wonderfully simple style to gift us with insights most of us today have neither skill or time to accomplish. Reading Eiseley changes your world. This book would makes a pretty gift for enquiring minds.

Science with style and feeling

If you haven't read Eiseley, you're missing a marvelous combination of style and information. He infused a sense of serene intimacy into an essay about science. He conveyed that he not only knew the subject, but cared. (Professor Eiseley died in 1977.) This small book is about the evolution of our planet from a time before flowers to become a world that's easier for human survival. The photographs are beautiful, but don't suit the text because they are anachronistic. They are like a grand dame (the text) dressed in the current fashion fad (modern plants). They are decorative, not illustrative. Botanical watercolors would have been better aligned with the subject. Nevertheless, the book is a beautiful little coffee table piece that contains well-written information that stimulates the intellect. It's not just eye-candy.