The Heart of Nature or, The Quest for Natural Beauty

Younghusband, Francis Edward, Sir, 1863-1942Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

Rating 3.4
Word count
380K words
Chapters
38

Tags

English Originals Human GeographyTravel AdventureNatural BeautyWild NatureNature ObservationAdventure JourneySpiritual PracticeEcological PhilosophyIntellectual CommentaryExotic Culture

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.The Heart of Nature; or, The Quest for Natural Beauty by YounghusbandAuthor: Younghusband, Francis Edward, Sir, 1863-1942,Language: English, Class: QH: Science: Natural history, Release Date: Nov 9, 2008

Editor's review

This is a collection of essays on the beauty of nature and the experience of it by Sir Francis Edward Younghusband, the British explorer and writer, falling under the category of natural science history. Having long travelled the high plateaus and mountains of Asia, the author blends observation of mountains, rivers, plants and wilderness with philosophical reflection; the prose is unhurried and restrained, describing both landscape and inner life. For today's readers its value lies not in precise ecological data but in the vision of nature it presents, one shaped by the modern naturalist tradition: entering nature through walking, gazing and contemplation, and asking where beauty and awe come from. It is suited to slow reading on quiet evenings or before and after outdoor journeys, especially for readers who love nature writing, travel essays and the naturalist tradition, and it can also serve as a sample of early twentieth-century British nature writing. Note that the book bears the marks of its era and of the author's own experience; it is best read with an eye to literary and intellectual history rather than as modern popular science.

Who it's for

A good fit for

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Reading tips

  1. Read one or two pieces a day, chapter by chapter, pausing afterwards to note the natural scenes they bring to mind.
  2. Read alongside a map or travel journal, comparing the terrain in the book with one's own experience.
  3. Mark unfamiliar words first and revisit them after finishing the whole piece rather than looking up every one.
  4. Read in comparison with other nature essays to appreciate how views of nature differ across eras.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

Contents

  1. 1
  2. 2
  3. 3
  4. 4
  5. 5
  6. 6
  7. 7
  8. 8
  9. 9
  10. 10
  11. 11
  12. 12
  13. 13
  14. 14
  15. 15
  16. 16
  17. 17
  18. 18
  19. 19
  20. 20
  21. 21
  22. 22
  23. 23
  24. 24
  25. 25
  26. 26
  27. 27
  28. 28
  29. 29
  30. 30
  31. 31
  32. 32
  33. 33
  34. 34
  35. 35
  36. 36
  37. 37
  38. 38

FAQ

Is this book a work of natural science? Not in the strict sense. It belongs to nature writing and the essay, focusing on the beauty of nature and personal feeling, with naturalist-style observation but no systematic ecological theory or experimental data; readers should not treat it as a popular science textbook.
How difficult is the English, and what level is it suited to? It is early twentieth-century English prose, with long sentences and literary vocabulary, of moderately high difficulty. Readers with a university-level reading foundation and a habit of reading essays will find it easier to enter; beginners can read slowly with a dictionary, focusing on the landscape descriptions and the development of thought.
What should I keep in mind when reading an electronic edition? This is a public-domain e-book, set mainly as plain text, and may lack notes and illustrations. A reading app with adjustable font size and a dictionary is recommended, along with a map or background material prepared in advance, for a fuller reading experience.

This site is an index: you start “Search all sources” in your browser, and the entries it lists all point to third-party sites; please judge their availability yourself.

About the author

Younghusband, Francis Edward, Sir, 1863-1942 Author · British · 1863–1942

Sir Francis Edward Younghusband (1863–1942) was a British explorer, army officer and writer. He travelled extensively in Central Asia and the interior of Asia, observing local geography and scenery at first hand, and later served as President of the Royal Geographical Society. Two of his works are held here: Kashmir, described by Sir Francis Younghusband, painted, which presents Kashmir through text and illustrations, and The Heart of Nature or, The Quest for Natural Beauty, which turns to the pursuit of natural beauty. Though one concerns regional scenery and the other natural aesthetics, both reflect the author's dual interests as traveller and observer of nature: his writing combines documentary detail with literary colour, valuing direct depiction of landscape and personal response. Public information on the details of his life is limited; this note draws only on the facts above, and readers may approach his travel and nature writing to understand his place in early twentieth-century geographical and nature literature.