Review_NONFICTION
other electromechanical marvels in lion-
ized, imperious old age and presenting
each decade of his life in reverse order,
back to his boyhood spells of intense,
isolated concentration. The ordering is
something of a gimmick—the book reads
nicely back to front—but along the way
Morris vividly fleshes out Edison’s
extraordinary intellect and industry as he
devoured stacks of scientific treatises,
incessantly brainstormed ideas with
complex, elegant diagrams, and spent a
lifetime of 18-hour days perfecting his
designs in the laboratory, where he ate
and slept on the floor. (His paternal
absenteeism, Morris notes, got a tragicomic
comeuppance from two resentful wastrel
sons who exploited his name to perpetrate
frauds.) Writing in amusing, literate prose
that’s briskly paced despite a mountain of
fascinating detail, Morris sets Edison’s
achievements against a colorful portrait of
his splendid eccentricity—mostly deaf, he
was given to biting phonographs and
pianos to divine their acoustics—whose
visionary obsessions drove his businesses
near to bankruptcy. The result is an
engrossing study of a larger-than-life figure
who embodied a heroic age of technology.
Photos. (Oct.)The Eight Master Lessons of
Nature: What Nature Teaches Us
About Living Well in the World
Gary Ferguson. Dutton, $27 (272p) ISBN 978-
1-5247-4338-3
In this expansive survey, nature writer
Ferguson (Walking Down the Wild) argues
that nature’s “harmony, balance, and
rhythm” can teach humans how to live
peaceful, vital lives. Ferguson’s eight
assertions each speak to the powerful
connections he sees between the natural
and human worlds, each beginning with
his lushly delivered observations of nature:
“With the wheatgrass and bluestem paper
dry, with many trees themselves at moisture
levels lower than kiln-dried lumber, the
land began to burn.” He then illustrates
how the observations have been used to
guide life—and asks readers to do the same.
For instance, “dark night... sky shot full
of stars... realms of wonder” can help
readers foster a healthy sense of mysteryby pondering the emptiness of deep
space. Also, a “tumbling mountainside
bedecked with the most glorious carpets
of wildflowers” can help readers learn to
thrive among diversity. Though organized
as a series of loose lessons, the book lacks
any real directives (lesson six, for example,
is “We Live on a Planet with Energy
Beyond Measure”), instead relying on
Ferguson’s broad view of human history
that each person is connected by universal
myths and the innate feeling that “nature
calls to each of us.” While nature lovers
will enjoy this, self-help readers looking for
concrete advice will be disappointed. (Oct.)James Baldwin: Living in Fire
Bill V. Mullen. Pluto, $27 (244p) ISBN 978-0-
7453-3854-5
Arguing James Baldwin (1924–1987)
was the “first African-American radical to
make his sexuality” key to his activism,
Mullen (W.E.B. Du Bois), an American
Studies professor at Purdue University,
offers a scrupulous, if somewhat niche in
its specifically political focus, biography.
Contending that Baldwin’s commitment