Gerald Durrell

by Botting, Douglas

• ISBN13: 9780786707966
• ISBN10: 0786707968
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2000-09-12
• Publisher: Da Capo Pr

Summary

Written with complete access to the Durrell family archives and Gerald Durrell's private papers, this affecting biography follows its subject from an eccentric boyhood in Imperial India to the international prominence he gained in print and on television as one of the world's foremost animal conservationists. The younger brother of the famous novelist Lawrence Durrell, Gerald always viewed his own writing - which includes thirty-seven bestsellers, among them enduringly popular classics like My Family and Other Animals and A Zoo in My Luggage - as the means of financing his greatest passion: breeding animals in danger of extinction and returning them to the wild. In the 1980s, with the production of a dozen different television documentary series on zoology, most notably the widely acclaimed Catch Me a Colobus and Ark on the Move, Durrell's conservationist vision reached audiences around the globe, while the zoo he founded on the island of Jersey realized his pioneering mission to breed endangered species in captivity. It stands as a living legacy of the much-admired Gerald Durrell, who died in 1995 at the age of seventy. "Captivating and deeply moving but surprisingly candid biography." - Publishers Weekly (starred review); "Ambitious.... Rich material for a biography." - New York Times Book Review; "Affectionate yet clear-eyed portrait.... Botting does an excellent job of giving us Durrell the man, not merely the legend." - Toronto Globe & Mail; "Few current biographies read as well." - Denver Post.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations	vii
Preface	xiii
Prologue	xix
PART 1: `The Boy's Mad...Snails in his Pockets!'	1	(112)
Landfall in Jamshedpur: India 1925--1928	3	(12)
`The Most Ignorant Boy in the School': England 1928--1935	15	(17)
The Gates of Paradise: Corfu 1935--1936	32	(24)
The Garden of the Gods: Corfu 1937--1939	56	(18)
Gerald in Wartime: England 1939--1945	74	(16)
Odd-Beast Boy: Whipsnade 1945--1946	90	(12)
Planning for Adventure: 1946--1947	102	(11)
PART 2: Promise Fulfilled	113	(162)
To the Back of Beyond: First Cameroons Expedition 1947--1948	115	(25)
In the Land of the Fon: Second Cameroons Expedition 1948--1949	140	(34)
New Worlds to Conquer: Love and Marriage 1949--1951	174	(17)
Writing Man: 1951--1953	191	(18)
Of Beasts and Books: 1953--1955	209	(16)
The Book of the Idyll: 1955	225	(8)
Man and Nature: 1955--1956	233	(17)
`A Wonderful Place for a Zoo': 1957--1959	250	(25)
PART 3: The Price of Endeavour	275	(194)
A Zoo is Born: 1959--1960	277	(17)
`We're All Going to be Devoured': Alarms and Excursions 1960--1962	294	(13)
Durrell's Ark: 1962--1965	307	(22)
Volcano Rabbits and the King of Corfu: 1965--1968	329	(15)
Crack-Up: 1968--1970	344	(12)
Pulling Through: 1970--1971	356	(12)
The Palace Revolution: 1971--1973	368	(16)
Gerald in America: 1973--1974	384	(10)
`Two Very Lost People': 1975--1976	394	(22)
Love Story -- Prelude: 1977--1978	416	(29)
Love Story -- Finale: 1978--1979	445	(24)
PART 4: Back on the Road	469	(100)
A Zoo with a View: 1979--1980	471	(20)
Ark on the Move: From the Island of the Dodo to the Land of the Lemur 1980--1982	491	(14)
The Amateur Naturalist: 1982--1984	505	(24)
To Russia with Lee: 1984--1985	529	(13)
Grand Old Man: 1985--1991	542	(27)
PART 5: A Long Goodbye	569	(34)
`Details of my Hypochondria': 1992--1994	571	(17)
`A Whole New Adventure': 1994--1995	588	(15)
Afterword	603	(6)
The Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust	609	(2)
Sources	611	(20)
Bibliography	631	(4)
Index	635