David Abram is an ecologist, anthropologist, and philosopher who lectures and teaches widely around the world. His prior book, The Spell of the Sensuous: Perception and Language in a More-than-Human World, helped catalyze the emergence of several new disciplines, including the burgeoning field of ecopsychology. The recipient of a Lannan Literary Award for Nonfiction, David was named by both the Utne Reader and the British journal Resurgence as one of a hundred visionaries transforming contemporary culture. His writings on the cultural causes and consequences of environmental disarray are published in numerous magazines, scholarly journals, and anthologies. A co-founder of the Alliance for Wild Ethics (AWE), David lives with his family in the foothills of the southern Rockies.
"A wild book in every sense of the word, full of stories that will
leave you trembling, but even fuller of ideas that will send you
out into the world with new eyes." --Bill McKibben, author of
Eaarth "This book is like a prehistoric cave. If you have the
nerve to enter it and you get used to the dark, you'll discover
things about storytelling which are startling, urgent and deeply
true. Things each of us once knew, but forgot when we were born
into the 19th and 20th centuries. Extraordinary rediscoveries!"
--John Berger, author of Ways of Seeing and Why Look at Animals
"I cannot imagine another book that so gently and so persuasively
alters how we look at ourselves." --Richard Louv, author of The
Nature Principle "One of the most compelling and important ecology
books in decades." --Rex Weyler, co-founder of Greenpeace
International "A truly alchemical book. . . . Those of us who still
hope for a revolutionary change in our thinking toward animals, the
living land and the climate will welcome this book. Abram is an
audacious thinker, a true visionary, and, really, just a damn good
nature writer." --San Francisco Book Review
"An intricately textured, deep breath of a book that blurs the
boundaries between human and animal, mind and earth. Prose as lush
as a moss-draped rain forest and as luminous as a high desert
night. . . Deeply resonant with indigenous ways of knowing, Abram
lets us listen in on wordless conversations with ancient boulders,
walruses,
birds, and roof beams. His profound recognition of intelligences
other than our own enables us to enter into reciprocal symbioses
that can, in turn, sustain the world. Becoming Animal illuminates a
way forward in restoring relationship with the earth, led by our
vibrant animal bodies to re-inhabit the glittering world." --Orion
"A stunning, compelling journey into embodied, earthly
intelligence, Becoming Animal is philosophy at its engaging best.
Prepare for a wild, profound ride into the essence of the human
animal--an essence embedded in communion with the Earth. A must
read for anyone concerned about the future of the planet and
ourselves." --Kieran Suckling, co-founder and Executive Director,
Center for Biological Diversity "In Becoming Animal, David Abram
has crafted the rarest of literary gems: a sublime effort combining
transcendent prose, lucid insight, and lasting consequence."
--Shambhala Sun "If we are to survive--indeed, if we are to stop
the dominant culture from killing the planet--it will be in great
measure because of brave and brilliant beings like David Abram.
This is a beautifully written, deeply moving, and important book."
--Derrick Jensen, author of A Language Older Than Words and Endgame
Becoming Animal brings us home to ourselves as living organs of
this wild planet. Its teachings leap off the page and translate
immediately into lived experience. --Joanna Macy, Buddhist scholar
and activist "Without doubt one of America's greatest nature
writers, one who ably follows in the footsteps of Muir, Thoreau and
Leopold. . . .[A] book of such transformative potential that it
needs to be read twice in quick succession to get the full benefit.
. . . The language is luminous, the style hypnotic. Abram weaves a
spell that brings the world alive."
--Resurgence "Pure enthusiasm drives Abram to explore the
yearning of our body for the larger body of Earth. . . . [Abram]
brings the magician's sense of mystery and playful surprise. . .
His celebratory embrace of all that surrounds him is refreshing in
the extreme."
--Kirkus Reviews "As with many deeply original--and
radical--books, this work may startle, even provoke the reader in
its electric reversal of conventional thought. . . . [T]his is a
portrait of the artist as a young raven, arguing, with all the
subtlety of his mind, for the mindedness of the body. An exercise
of uncanny imagination." --Jay Griffiths, author of Wild
"This brave and magical book summons wild wonder to remind us who
we are."
--Amory B. Lovins, Chief Scientist, Rocky Mountain Institute
"Speculative, learned, and always 'lucid and precise' as the eye of
the vulture that confronted him once on a cliff ledge, Abram has
one of those rare minds which, like the mind of a musician or a
great mathematician, fuses dreaminess with smarts." --The
Village Voice "Refreshing. [Abram] allows himself to be
expansive, sentimental, and more than a little mad. . . . His book
is transformative, animated by piercing observations and
hallucinatory intensity." --Bookforum
"This startling, sparkling book challenges the technological temper
of our times by returning us to the animal body in ourselves. Abram
shows brilliantly how this body brings us back to Earth in a series
of acutely moving descriptions of its polysensory genius. An
original work of primary philosophy, it is written with verve,
passion, and poetry." --Edward S. Casey, author of The Fate of
Place: A Philosophical History
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