Rachel Carson: Silent Spring & Other Environmental Writings

“The number of books that have done as much good in the world [as Silent Spring] can be counted on the arms of a starfish.” —Jill Lepore, The New Yorker“Silent Spring, then as now, is a shock… . Two hundred pages of letters and talks and short articles fill out the balance of [this Library of America] edition, two hundred bright points of light whose constellation is an image of scientific effort, scientific outreach, science-backed advocacy.” —Daegan Miller, Bookforum “Silent Spring remains five decades after publication, an impressive piece of work—and a deserving candidate for the Library of America series… . To read [it] now is in part to understand how we got to where we are.”— Charles C. Mann, The Wall Street Journal “Some say Rachel Carson almost single-handedly launched the modern environmentalist movement with Silent Spring. This Library of America collection brings that groundbreaking work together with her writings to reassert just how influential she was. A vital collection for any environmentalist.” —Chicago Review of Books “Reading Silent Spring today, in the hazy reddish glow of climate catastrophe, is both an exhilarating and a melancholy pleasure. The story of Carson’s dogged pursuit of truth against all odds – the lack of settled science, her own daily struggle with breast cancer, the personal attacks launched by the chemical industry after the book’s publication – is profoundly inspiring at a time when hope in such endeavours seems to be in short supply.” —London Review of Books

Rachel Carson (1907-1964) was born on a family farm near Springdale, Pennsylvania. She earned a master’s in zoology at Johns Hopkins before taking a job with the U.S. Bureau of Fisheries. She published Under the Sea-Wind (1941), The Sea Around Us (1951, winner of a National Book Award), and The Edge of the Sea (1955). Silent Spring (1962), her expose of the disastrous ecological effects of pesticide use, was an international bestseller.A research biologist and cancer survivor, Sandra Steingraber was inspired to activism by Silent Spring, becoming one of America’s leading environmental writers and antipollution advocates. Distinguished Scholar in Residence at Ithaca College, her books include Living Downstream- An Ecologist’s Personal Investigation of Cancer and the Environment (1997), Having Faith- An Ecologist’s Journey to Motherhood (2001), and Raising Elijah- Protecting Our Children in an Age of Environmental Crisis (2011).

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