Social History

		Social History of Natural History

	All that really links these books is that they are about people who look at birds (or plants or moths or whatever), rather than being about what they looked at. There is a bias towards birds, but some books about other disciplines. As there is rather a lot of them, I've divided them into some arbitrary categories: biographies, birding, frauds, history, novels, year-listing.
	Biographies
	Whose Bird? (Helm 2003) Bo Beolens and Michael Watkins Short biographies of every single person whose name appears in the English or scientific names of birds. It my seem like an extension of the Mearns' books, but it has different origins, beginning on an internet forum before expanding into a book. Many of the biographies just scratch the surface, whereas others give, in just a few lines, the sum of our knowledge on the more obscure characters to have been immortalised.
	Richard Meinertzhagen: Soldier, Scientist and Spy (Secker & Warburg 1989) Mark Cocker Fascinating insight into one of the most famous ornithological fraudsters (although like many others who faked some of their data, their real contribution is often forgotten). In actual fact, if you want to know about Meinertzhagen's ornithological work you'll be disappointed, even though this book was written by a birder. But there was so much more to this complex character that his life-story is fascinating enough without further subterfuge.
	Biographies for Birdwatchers (Academic Press 1988) Audubon to Xantus (Academic Press 1992) Barbara and Richard Mearns Two excellent reviews of the lives of the men (or occasionally women) who have had their name immortalised in the names of European or North American birds. Much more detailed than the more wide-ranging Whose Bird? with details of the person's ornithological career. Although some characters are rather obscure (who exactly was M. Dupont?), others such as Rueppell, Audubon, Wilson, Hodgson or Hume, made huge contributions to ornithology and there are also some fascinating tales - the expeditions of Pallas or Steller, for example, or the extraordinary career of John Xantus.
	The Aurelian Legacy: British Butterflies and their Collectors (Harley Books 2000) Michael Salmon One half of the book deals with butterflies, but the other gives potted biographies of 100 famous collectors, many of whom, such as the Rothschilds were involved in wider schemes.
	Guardian Spirit of the East Bank: a Celebration of the Life of R. A. Richardson (Wren Publishing 2002) Moss Taylor
	Birding
	How to be a Bad Birdwatcher (Short Books 2004) Simon Barnes Simon Barnes is a journalist who writes on sport and the environment.
	Birders: Tales of a Tribe Mark Cocker
	Bill Oddie's Little Black Bird Book (Eyre Methuen 1980, reprint Robson Books 1998) Gone Birding (Methuen 1983) Follow That Bird (Robson Books 1998) Gripping Yarns (A & C Black 2000) Bill Oddie A quarter of a century on and BOLBBB, as it is affectionately abbreviated, remains the funniest and most accurate assessment of birders and what makes them tick and it remains one of the first recommendations I would make to anyone wanting to know what makes a birder tick (in both senses of the word). The stuff on fooling the rarities committee is perceptive and amusing and surprisingly little has dated. Gone Birding and Follow That Bird are more conventional autobiographical stuff, but still with a sense of humour, while Gripping Yarns is a collection of Oddie's columns from Birdwatching magazine, which includes several which will bring a wry smile to the lips, as well as others which bring an insight into the psyche of the birder.
	Beguiled by Birds Ian Wallace
	Frauds
	Of Moths and Men: Intrigue, Tragedy and the Peppered Moth (Fourth Estate 2002) Judith Hooper A controversial book which examines the study of melanism in Peppered Moths which is used worldwide as an example of evolution in response to changing environmental conditions. It suggests that the work carried by Bernard Kettlewell, with the support and encouragement of the eminent entomologist E. B. Ford, was falsified. Despite the fact that many eminent entomologists still support the study, and the fact that a whole host of ill-guided creationists have inaccurately leapt on the accusations as support for their own beliefs, the case is strongly and entertainingly presented.
	A Rum Affair: a True Story of Botanical Fraud (Da Capo 1999) Karl Sabbagh An undeniable example of fraud in natural science. John Heslop Harrison believed that Rum, off the west coast of Scotland, had not been ice-covered during the last ice age and therefore acted as a refuge for wild plants during the glaciation. To support his theory, which was contrary to the opinion of other scientists, he took plants to the island and planted them there. Essential reading for anyone who doubts that scientists fabricate their results.
	History
	The Naturalist in Britain: A Social History (Penguin 1976, revised edition Princeton University Press 1994) David Allen A rather serious and learned history of the study of natural history, which ends up being a social history as much as it is an account about nature. The author comes from a botanical background, and the scope of the book covers all disciplines, from geology to birdwatching, but the coverage of an unparalleled breadth of the subject makes it essential reading for anyone with an interest in the development of the study of nature, but it is not light reading. The author is currently writing a book on Nature Publishing in Britain in the Collins New Naturalist series.
	The English Parson-Naturalist (Gracewing 2000) Patrick Armstrong Written by the son of a parson-naturalist (the author's father was E. A. Armstrong, author of a monograph on the Wren).
	The Shell Bird Book James Fisher
	The Bird Collectors Barbara and Richard Mearns
	A Bird in the Bush: a Social History of Birdwatching (Aurum Press 2004) Stephen Moss
	A Concise History of Ornithology (Helm 2005) Michael Walters
	Novels
	Adventure Lit their Star (Latimer House 1949, reprinted MacDonald 1962, Penguin 1972) Kenneth Allsop A strange book - surely the only novel written in the English language with a Little Ringed Plover as a main character. Highly praised by some, I found it be something of curiosity. Huge parts of the book have no human characters, so it reads like a cross between Tarka the Otter and the script for a slightly quaint summer-at-the-gravel-pits type Sunday night edition of The Natural World, although some of these passages are quite evocative. The sudden appearance of rare birds well described, so that you feel that you are there watching them, but the humans flit in and out of the text and while the delight of finding a rare bird translates to today's experience, the egg-collecting passage seems particularly anachronistic for many reasons.
	A Bird in the Hand (1986) Sea Fever (Allison & Busby 1993) Ann Cleeves Ann Cleeves
	Pelican Blood (Fourth Estate 2005) Cris Freddi Considering that this books seems to aimed at a mainstream audience, there is an awful lot of birding in it. Not surprising, perhaps, as Cris Freddi is an ex-twitcher, and while the passages about twitching emphasise the futility of the pastime, sometimes with an ex-smokers' anti-smoking zeal, he has not forgotten the thrill and the passion. Strangely, for an ex-twitcher there are several birding errors (the white rump of Solitary Sandpiper?). The book gives quite an insight into the psyche of the twitcher, even if the characters are a little larger than life (this is fiction after all), and the obsessiveness is well-observed, perhaps best exemplified during the passage when two characters are having a dramatic cliff-top appraisal of their life and aims at dawn and one can't help noticing the birds starting to fly around while listening before thinking - this is not the time to identify them, after all, they're only gulls! Well-written and original, the book is accurately described in the blurb as 'foul-mouthed and lyrical' - don't read it if you're offended by the f word, but do read it if you want to think.
	Year Listing
	The Big Twitch Sean Dooley
	Kingbird Highway (Houghton Mifflin 2001) Kenn Kaufman
	The Big Year (Bantam 2005) Mark Obmascik An account of three birders attempts to break the American year-list record, written by a non-birding journalist. Occasionally grating, veering towards tabloid-speak, but the account is written in a style that could almost be described as 'rollicking' and the episodic, script-like approach has not gone un-noticed - apparently the film rights have been bought up. The only real disappointment is that the final result is not in doubt from quite early on.
	Arrivals and Rivals - a Birding Oddity: A Year of Competitive Twitching (Brambleby Books 2004) Adrian Riley Oh dear. The Americans have the relaxed and engaging fluency of Kaufmann's Kingbird Highway or the occasionally over-journalistic but engaging Big Year, books which explain the psyche of birding as well as the thrill and the obsessiveness. Unfortunately, this book does not compete. Not only is the writing rather leaden, and the asides about Leeds United are merely incongruous, but the book gets bogged down in the mud-slinging that tarnishes competitive listing in Britain. Unfortunately, the author's attempt to claim the moral high ground by claiming that all his records are verified and submitted is rather let down by the fact that several prominent records have not been accepted. If you want a book that explains the thrill, expense and futility of year-listing then look to another continent.