Views of Nature or Contemplations on the Sublime Phenomena of Creation with Scientific Illustrations by Alexander Von Humboldt

Book Description

Secondhand. Good condition. Wear to book corners and edges. Foxing to many pages.

This 1850 edition of Views of Nature is a collection of seven vivid, scientific essays describing a specific ecosystem, followed by an extensive section of scientific endnotes that contain detailed meteorological, botanical, and geological data.

Humboldt uses his pioneering journeys through the Americas and Central Asia to argue that geography, climate, and living things cannot be understood in isolation, but only as parts of a harmonious whole. It contains iconic chapters such as Steppes and Deserts, Cataracts of the Orinoco, Nocturnal Life of Animals in the Primeval Forests, and The Plateau of Caxamarca.

This is the first major authorised English translation of Alexander von Humboldt's final, expanded 1849 German text that blends data with poetic, aesthetic prose to present Earth as an interconnected living organism.

Features a colour frontispiece engraved from a sketch by Humboldt and a facsimile of his handwriting.

Translated from German by E.C. Otté and Henry G. Bohn. First English edition.