Rachel Carson’s classic trilogy comprises three volumes – The Sea Around Us (1950), Under the Sea-Wind (1941) and The Edge of the Sea (1955). The Sea Around Us presents an overview of the subject, a natural history of the oceans in which Rachel Carson discusses such matters as their origins, the evolution of life, the creation of volcanic islands and the history of sea exploration.
Rachel Louise Carson (1907 – 1964) was an American marine biologist and conservationist whose book Silent Spring and other writings are credited with advancing the global environmental movement. Carson began her career as an aquatic biologist and became a full-time nature writer in the 1950s. She highlighted conservation, especially environmental problems that she believed were caused by synthetic pesticides, most notably DDT. She brought environmental concerns to a global audience through her writing, inspiring grassroots environmental movements across the planet.
"This combination of science and scintillating prose provides fascinating insights into the mysteries of the tides [...] a masterpiece of ecological writing"
– Guardian
"Carson's books brought ecology into popular consciousness"
– Daily Telegraph
"[Carson] is the poet laureate of the sea, but also of that "web of life", in which everything is connected to everything else"
– London Review of Books