Into Great Silence

by SAULITIS, EVA

• ISBN13: 9780807014462
• ISBN10: 080701446X
• Format: Trade Paper
• Copyright: 2014-02-25
• Publisher: Beacon Press

Summary

Science entwines with matters of the human heart as a whale researcher chronicles the lives of an endangered family of orcas
 
Ever since Eva Saulitis began her whale research in Alaska in the 1980s, she has been drawn deeply into the lives of a single extended family of endangered orcas struggling to survive in Prince William Sound. Over the course of a decades-long career spent observing and studying these whales, and eventually coming to know them as individuals, she has, sadly, witnessed the devastation wrought by the Exxon Valdez oil spill of 1989—after which not a single calf has been born to the group. With the intellectual rigor of a scientist and the heart of a poet, Saulitis gives voice to these vital yet vanishing survivors and the place they are so loyal to. Both an elegy for one orca family and a celebration of the entire species, Into Great Silence is a moving portrait of the interconnectedness of humans with animals and place—and of the responsibility we have to protect them.

Author Biography

Eva Saulitis has studied whales in Prince William Sound, the Kenai Fjords, and Alaska’s Aleutian Islands for the past twenty-four years. In addition to her scientific publications, her essays, poems, and reviews have appeared in numerous national journals, including Orion, Crazyhorse, and Prairie Schooner. The author of the essay collection Leaving Resurrection and the poetry collection Many Ways to Say It, she teaches at Kenai Peninsula College, in the low-residency MFA program at the University of Alaska, and at the Kachemak Bay Writers’ Conference. She lives in Homer, Alaska.

Table of Contents

A NOTE ABOUT NAMES
PROLOGUE:  THE LAST ONE
                                                                                   
PART 1:  PLACE OF FIRST PERMISSION
   1. BY BEAVER, BY BEAR
   2. LUCKY STAR
   3. WHALE CAMP
   4. FIRST ENCOUNTER
   5. CUT LOOSE
   6. INTO THE LABYRINTH
   7. MEMORIZE THESE THINGS
   8. THE SURVIVAL VALUE OF EXUBERANCE
   9. BOYS IN BLUEBERRY SEASON
10. NO PASSAGE OUT
11. VEGANS AND CARNIVORES
                                                     
PART 2:  SEASON OF DEAD WATER
  1. REFUGIA
   2. WHEN IT HAPPENS
   3. WHERE THE WHALES ARE
   4.  PART OF THE DARKNESS
   5. INTO THE ICE, INTO THE OIL
   6. GROUNDINGS
   7. BEAST AND BEAUTY
   8. SCIENTIFIC MAGIC
   9. THE WHALE CALLED EYAK
10.  ON BEGIN HUSHED AND SILENT
11. TALLYING ICEBERGS
12. WILD HORSES, GREEN SKIES
13. MERCIFULLY UNTRANSLATABLE                                                                                                                              
PART 3:  SURVIVORS
   1. A HUMAN SILENCE
   2. IN NAMED AND UNNAMED COVES
   3. THE SMALLEST ISLAND
   4. IT BARELY MAKES A SOUND
   5. BREATHING IN NEVER-NIGHT
   6. TRANSIENTS OUTSIDE THE BOX
   7. UNCOMMON LANGUAGE
8. THE POETRY OF PREDATION
9. NINE SILENCES                                                                                                                                                                   
PART 4:  INTO GREAT SILENCE
 
1.      HUNGER
2.      MORE THAN WE UNDERSTAND
3.      WHAT THE NUMBERS SAY
4.      WHAT THE SILENCE SAYS
5.      SPACES BETWEEN FACTS
6.      SILENCE AS SURVIVAL
7.      THE STORY INSIDE THE FLESH
8.      SNIPPETS AND TRANSPARENCIES
9.      THE OTHER WORLD
10. WHERE THE SEALS ARE
11. BOOK OF CHANGES
12. LAMENT FOR EYAK
13. IN A LANGUAGE LOST TO US, EYAK IS SINGING
14. THE SPIRIT LINE
 
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS