Audiobook · read by volunteers
Natural History of Selborne
Gilbert White (1720–1793)
Read by Peter Yearsley · 14 chapters · 9 h 14
About the book
In a quiet Hampshire village in the eighteenth century, a curate with a notebook, a sharp eye and a great deal of patience spent decades writing down what he saw around him. The Natural History of Selborne is the result: a series of letters to two friends in which Gilbert White describes birds, insects, plants, weather and the habits of the animals he knew in his own parish. His curiosity is infectious, his language is simple, and his gentle humour colours many of the anecdotes. The book is organised as letters to the naturalists Thomas Pennant and Daines Barrington, and it has been popular ever since it appeared. Fourteen sections and over nine hours of listening, read by one voice, make an unhurried and soothing companion for lovers of the countryside.
Introduction
Gilbert White, who lived from 1720 to 1793, was an English clergyman and naturalist. He was curate of Selborne, a village in Hampshire, from 1784 until his death in 1793, and he lived most of his life in the village. The Natural History and Antiquities of Selborne, published in 1789, has hardly been out of print since, and it is often counted among the most frequently reissued books in English.
The book takes the form of a collection of letters to two friends, discussing the natural history of the areas he knew well and natural history in general. The recipients were the zoologist Thomas Pennant and the lawyer and naturalist Daines Barrington, and the letters are grouped by correspondent. White observed birds, swallows, bats, tortoises and trees with close and patient attention. His intense curiosity and his love for the world about him flow through his simple, straightforward style, and a gentle sense of humour colours many of his anecdotes.
White is sometimes seen as a precursor of modern ecology, because he studied animals in their habitat and recorded the details of their behaviour through the year. Later naturalists and writers have praised the book for its accuracy and its charm.
This LibriVox recording is divided into fourteen sections, beginning with the introduction and the letters to Pennant, and lasts a little over nine hours. It is read by Peter Yearsley. You can listen in small portions, much as the letters were originally read, one at a time. Its quiet pleasures are those of attention: the arrival of the swallows, the habits of the bat, the changing seasons in a single parish, all noticed and described with affection.
Public domain
Gilbert White died in 1793: the work is in the public domain in Switzerland, more than 70 years after the author’s death.
The LibriVox volunteers dedicated this recording to the public domain.
Sources : LibriVox page · Files at the Internet Archive · Original text