Gavin Maxwell, 1914-1969

[Richard Tarleton]

But is it obvious? Growth rate in population has been declining in every continent of the world in recent decades.

The human population has risen from 3.7 billion in 1970 to 7.2 billion today, and is on course to reach 9.6 billion by 2050. That's a big increase. There are of course fluctuations in the birth rate in different countries. And the demands on resources are increasing exponentially. The ZSL study also looks at the ecological footprint of different countries. Residents of Kuwait require the equivalent of 10 hectares per citizen to produce the goods and services they require, the USA 7, East Timor 0.5. "If all the people on the planet had the footprint of the average resident of Qatar, we would need 48 planets", says the report.

DA a naturalist not a politician or economist and may have picked poor examples, but if he's saying that population can't keep growing and using all these resources, surely he's right?

Separate thread on Population and the Planet? ff, cali, anyone looking in?

[french frank]

I've copied the relevant posts to the new thread http://www.for3.org/forums/showthrea...and-the-Planet to keep this discussion coherent. Perhaps a steer on where this one might go now?

[Richard Tarleton]

It may have run its course, I felt I had to share Kathleen Raine, but aeolium's re mysoginistic naturalist authors looked promising....Konrad Lorenz a fascinating case, aeolium rightly read from the charge sheet but he also managed to write one of the most beautiful and insightful books on animals there is, as well as co-founding a new branch of zoological study, sharing a Nobel prize with Niko Tinbergen...

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

I should have mentioned earlier, Richard, that I found your #7 a fascinating post - you convey the honest intensity of Raine's memoir that I feel I have to read it for myself. Many thanks.

[aeolium]

It may have run its course, I felt I had to share Kathleen Raine, but aeolium's re mysoginistic naturalist authors looked promising....Konrad Lorenz a fascinating case, aeolium rightly read from the charge sheet but he also managed to write one of the most beautiful and insightful books on animals there is, as well as co-founding a new branch of zoological study, sharing a Nobel prize with Niko Tinbergen...

Yes, RT, I didn't intend to downplay the significance of Lorenz's work or the quality of his writing. I also very much like T H White's The Goshawk about his attempt to train one (IIRC while he was in Ireland).

Julian Huxley perhaps another interesting case....

[amateur51]

I should have mentioned earlier, Richard, that I found your #7 a fascinating post - you convey the honest intensity of Raine's memoir that I feel I have to read it for myself. Many thanks.

Hear hear! hoping to get a copy soon

[kernelbogey]

I think this thread has opened a little project for me to reread Maxwell, and read Kathleen Raine's autobiography. (I've often been curious about her as she was once married to Hugh Sykes-Davis, who taught me.)

The theme that survives here for me is the frequency with which those who agree with Sartre - "L'enfer, c'est les autres" - turn from their perceived hell of other humans to the perceived Eden of the animal kingdom.

Werner Herzog's film Grizzly Man narrates the story of Timothy Treadwell, who escaped humankind for many summers to live close to grizzlies in Alaska; he includes extensively Treadwell's own video footage. Towards the end of the film, Herzog's voice-over asserts (and I paraphrase loosely) that, in contrast to Treadwell's belief that he made genuine contact with these animals, Herzog saw in them only a completely ruthless pursuit of food. Indeed Treadwell and his girlfriend were killed by a bear.

My more than 40-year old recollections of Ring of Bright Water are that a similar pre-lapsarian idealisation of animals pervades the book.

P.S. (Edit) Many thanks Richard for the thread and for post no 7.

[Richard Tarleton]

Thanks kernelbogey (and thanks ferney for kind words) - I'm doing something similar, following up the Raine book with Douglas Botting's 1993 authorised [presumably by the family] biography - Botting knew Maxwell well from before the death of Mijbil, spent a winter looking after Sandaig, last saw Maxwell in November 1968, less than a year before his death. I'm hoping this will pull the threads of an extraordinary life together. The book was republished under a new title, it's now called The Saga of Ring of Bright Water - The Enigma of Gavin Maxwell.

[Richard Tarleton]

None of the Durham team on University Challenge tonight could name the author of Ring of Bright Water...didn't stop them crushing Brasenose though....