| No One Loved Gorillas More: Dian Fossey - Letters From the Mist | 
 enlarge | Author: Camilla De La Bedoyere
Creator: Bob Campbell
Publisher: Palazzo Editions
Category: Book
List Price: £19.99
Buy Used: £11.18
You Save: £8.81 (44%)
Used (8) from £11.18
Avg. Customer Rating:  2 reviews
Sales Rank: 473371
Media: Hardcover
Pages: 192
Shipping Weight (lbs): 2.3
Dimensions (in): 9.8 x 9.5 x 0.9
ISBN: 095451033X
Dewey Decimal Number: 599
EAN: 9780954510336
ASIN: 095451033X
Publication Date: April 7, 2005
Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days
|
| Customer Reviews:
 An incredible story beautifully told October 7, 2007
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
The voice and complex personality of Dian Fossey come through powerfully in the narrative, which draws together many incredible events in an an extraordinary life using a series of letters and photographs. The author takes great care to neither condemn nor celebrate Fossey's own rather peculiar, albeit successful (to some degree) methods of conservation, and places them in a historical context. Bob Campbell's photograhs capture the beauty of the mountain gorillas and their habitat, and reading about the harsh conditions in which he and Fossey had to work further increases one's admiration for them both. A very readable story for the interested lay person.
 Does what it says on the tin July 27, 2007
For me the best thing about this book is that it gives a fair account of the life of Dian Fossey, as opposed to the slightly idealistic views expressed by many of her biographers. In Letters from the Mist Bedoyere is not afraid to express the difficult side of Fosseys character. This book confronts these issues and gives anecdotes and reasons for her behaviour without excusing them. In fact the book can be considered as a biography, with the letters mainly used to back up what the author is saying.
This is one of the downsides because the letter extracts are short and there are large chunks missing. Sometimes quotes from a letter may be only a couple of lines long whereas it would be nice to be able to read whole letter or at least longer extracts. Another unfortunate omission is that there are no replies to any of the letters at all. It would be good to see what the recipient of the letter wrote back to Fossey, but that is unavailable.
Bare in mind that this book does not cover Fosseys work in any detail. It is aimed at her personality and her attitude towards the trials and tribulations she faced rather than specifically about her work. If you are looking for a book about gorillas then look elsewhere because there is very little written about her research findings or how they were used.
Given how difficult it is to photograph gorillas in the wild the photography in this book is superb. It may not be very dramatic and the vast majority of the photos consist of gorillas relaxing amongst leaves because that is the only time photographers are able to get close enough to work. There are no images of chest beating, fighting or mating because these were simply impossible at the time but there are fantastic pictures of gorillas in their natural habitat throughout the book.
The murder of Dian Fossey remain one of the great tragedies of conservation and this book is valuable in its way of celebrating her life while not hiding away from awkward facts. It wont be everybodys cup of tea and more exposure of her letters would have been nice but its a very interesting read worthy of the couple of days it will take to read. Get it from the library.
|
|
|
