Remarkable Baobab Cl

by Pakenham,Thomas

• ISBN13: 9780393059892
• ISBN10: 0393059898
• Edition: 00
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2004-10-17
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company

Summary

Acclaimed historian Thomas Pakenham-who has dramatized in photographs and words the sheer majesty of trees throughout the world-now trains his lens on the most mysterious of trees, the baobab, with spectacular results. His search for the world's most striking baobabs has led him over the last eight years on a trail from sub-Saharan Africa to Madagascar and Australia, the Caribbean, and the United States. Here, in The Remarkable Baobab, Pakenham records his personal encounters with these mysterious giants, tracing their mythologies, their natural grandeur, and their origins, as well as their chances of survival in an uncertain environment. As Pakenham notes, the baobab may indeed be one of the oldest life forms on the planet, and many of the specimens still standing today have been alive for well over a thousand years. Standing tall on the savannahs of Africa and the sunburned plains of Australia, they are tremendous in size and have provided food, medicine, and places of refuge and worship to many, even serving as prisons, tombs, and ossuaries on occasion. Over the last one thousand years they have gained mythical status among many peoples, due in no small part to their appearance-without leaves, the branches of the trees look like roots growing into the sky. The Remarkable Baobab also includes a special section devoted to two famous baobabs in North America-one which is now over twenty feet in girth and is planted on a private Florida estate, the other a breathtaking specimen on the campus of the University of Arizona that was brought to the United States by smugglers. These stories are but two examples provided by Thomas Pakenham in The Remarkable Baobab, a book that is as visually bewitching as the baobab itself. Book jacket.

Author Biography

Thomas Pakenham's Remarkable Trees of the World received international acclaim

Table of Contents

Introduction	6	(12)
The Wooden Elephant
They Sailed From Here	18	(28)
Baobabs of Madagascar
The Upside Down Tree	46	(58)
Baobabs of Africa
Wizards of Oz	104	(18)
Boabs of Australia
In Captivity	122	(14)
Baobabs of the Caribbean
Acknowledgements	136	(1)
Bibliography	137	(2)
Distribution of Baobabs	139	(1)
Index	140	(2)
Illustration Credits	142