What is important, he says, is that each person have such a wilderness, and see-truly see-what wonders exist there. I can at best report only from my own wilderness” (13). “I have given the record of what one man thought as he pursued research and pressed his hands against the confining walls of scientific method in his time. He claims he does not pretend to speak for anyone but himself. Eiseley might refute that, if he were alive today. Eiseley’s narrator is metaphor for the journey of all humankind through the vast dimension of time and space-a journey filled with perplexity, delight, and impermanence. By the time we read these words we have come to realize that Eiseley is not just talking about his own life’s journey. “Forward and backward I have gone, and for me it has been an immense journey” (13). Like the narrator of a play who observes the drama unfold from the sidelines, Eiseley observes the story of life unfolding throughout history, recounting some of it to us in his own story. But it is Eiseley the storyteller-the consummate raconteur-whom I most want to read when I’m curled up with a book for the evening. Indeed, what makes Eiseley so fascinating is that he is a complex and multi-faceted individual.

He is a member of the expedition who hunts for bones, sleeping by the blazing campfire at night.

He is the teacher who backs away from the podium after an engaging lecture to make a quick dash for his office. An anthropologist, a scholar, a poet, a genius. Will it be Eiseley the forsaken child, Eiseley the teacher, or Eiseley the wandering philosopher? Who, indeed, is Loren Eiseley? An “imaginative naturalist,” according to the cover of his book, The Immense Journey. I often wonder, as I sit down to read any Loren Eiseley book, which Eiseley willīe there to greet me. As a collection the essay represent a coherent philosophy, where each aspect is scrutinized to reveal something wonderous.Loren Eiseley: 'The Immense Journey' Book review Each step of their development is miraculous, a catalyst to further inquiry. He can see the planet before man or flowers. To Eiseley there is nothing normal about nature. A crack in the Iowa earth of his childhood becomes a cavern, turning up the skull of an ancient rodent. The scientist altered evolutionary theory permanently and each one of these essays is grounded in his knowledge. This book may be small, but the journey is immense. Meditations on minutiae may give us insight to a greater meaning.

He encourages us to wonder at minute details we might overlook: a spiderweb on a streetlamp, an ancient fossil. Anthropologist and naturalist Loren Eiseley tells the story of man in a creative blend of science and imagination. A gem of poetic prose probing the mysteries of man and nature.

The immense journey by loren eiseley