Grasshopper Dreaming: Reflections on Killing and Loving

Rating:
Summary: A polished gem
Review: The subject categories on the copyright page, "1. Grasshoppers 2. Grasshoppers -- Ecology 3. Insect pests -- Control -- Environmental aspects," may lead to serendipity for some entomologists, but there needs to be more of a clue for the rest of us. This is a book about ecology more than grasshoppers, living in the world more than pest control. The author's deep understanding and experience in killing grasshoppers is what caused and organizes the book, but not what it's about.

It is a thoughtful treatise on our place on this earth, on the reality of the universe and on the irony and paradox (as Lockwood puts it) of the impossibility of victory in the battle between scientific materialism and religious understanding.

Rating:
Summary: A polished gem
Review: The subject categories on the copyright page, "1. Grasshoppers 2. Grasshoppers -- Ecology 3. Insect pests -- Control -- Environmental aspects," may lead to serendipity for some entomologists, but there needs to be more of a clue for the rest of us. This is a book about ecology more than grasshoppers, living in the world more than pest control. The author's deep understanding and experience in killing grasshoppers is what caused and organizes the book, but not what it's about.

It is a thoughtful treatise on our place on this earth, on the reality of the universe and on the irony and paradox (as Lockwood puts it) of the impossibility of victory in the battle between scientific materialism and religious understanding.