“There was no TV when I was a child,” says the primatologist Jane Goodall, author (most recently) of “The Book of Hope.” “I learned from books — and nature. I read every book about animals I could find. Doctor Dolittle and Tarzan led me to dream about living with animals in Africa.”
What books are on your night stand?
“The Perfect Gentleman: A Muslim Boy Meets the West,” to remind me to reread. It is brilliant and I know the author, Imran Ahmad. And “Cult: Following My Escape and Return to the Children of God,” by Bexy Cameron. I skimmed it and it is an extraordinary and chillingly true autobiography. Don’t know how long they’ll sit there, though — no time to read them.
By the end of a day of Zooms and Skypes and emails my eyes are too tired to read, so I turn to audiobooks. I need something soothing to stop the racing thoughts about all I haven’t managed to accomplish that day and all I have to do the next. Like an Agatha Christie. The reader matters — I love Hugh Fraser’s voice. Another audiobook: “Beautiful Ruins,” by Jess Walter. His mastery of the different voices of his characters is quite extraordinary.
What’s the last great book you read?
Tolkien’s “The Lord of the Rings” — the author has created another world that becomes totally real even as the story grips you. Moreover, the book is like an allegory of the challenges we face in today’s dark times. We need to grow the Fellowship of the Ring to fight the evil forces of autocratic regimes, the swing to the far right, the disrespect of nature that has led to climate change, extinction of species and the pandemic; industrial agriculture including the horrendous factory farms — the list is endless.
And the book gives hope: Two little hobbits, Frodo and the faithful Sam, faced the might of Mordor and the Dark Lord alone — and won! And then how the gift from Galadriel to Sam enabled him to restore the degraded land.
Describe your ideal reading experience (when, where, what, how).
When: When I do not have a pressing list of Zoom meetings and lectures, motivational videos to write and record, and no fewer than 500 urgent emails to answer. In other words, not in the immediate future Where: On a plane. What: Reread “Lord of the Rings” and “Other Men’s Flowers,” an anthology of poems by Lord Wavell which includes almost all of my favorites. How: As my eyes are so tired at the end of the day from sitting in front of a screen, audiobooks.
What’s your favorite book no one else has heard of?
The only book I know no one has heard of is “Jane — By Her Mother,” because it was never published!
Which writers — novelists, playwrights, critics, journalists, poets — working today do you admire most?
Those who write about social and environmental problems, especially when they are living in repressive regimes where they risk — and often lose — their lives.
Was reading a big part of your life during the decades that you lived among wild chimpanzees? What books, or what kinds of books, did you read in that period?
I read no books, as I was utterly focused on first finding, then observing the chimpanzees, and in the evening transcribing my field notes. Every day up in the mountains at dawn, back at dusk.
Are there researchers or popular science writers you especially admire? What science and nature writers would you recommend for a general audience?
I admire Rachel Carson, who wrote “Silent Spring,” and Steven Drucker, who spent 11 years researching the dangers of genetically modified food to write “Altered Genes, Twisted Truth.” For a general audience I would also recommend David Quammen (his latest was “Spillover,” about the origin of zoonotic diseases); Peter Wohlleben, who wrote “The Hidden Life of Trees”; and Meg Lowman, who wrote “The Arbornaut.” Craig Foster and Ross Frylinck describe a magic world in “Underwater Wild.”
What’s the most interesting thing you learned from a book recently?
The ability of trees to communicate with each other by means of an underground network of their roots and the fungal threads attached to them. I’m longing to know more about the amazing ecosystem of a forest canopy. Meg Lowman recently gave me a copy of “The Arbornaut.” So far I’ve only read the prologue and Chapter 1, but I wrote about her amazing discoveries in my last book, “Seeds of Hope.” And here I might add that I learned so many things, so much that was new to me, about the amazing vegetable kingdom when researching that book.
Which subjects do you wish more authors would write about?
The amazing people and projects around the world that show the resilience of nature, the indomitable human spirit, the power of informed young people, the amazing innovation of scientists fighting climate change (e.g., solar, wind, tidal power; improving battery storage for electric cars; alternative methods of farming that are bringing back life to the soil contaminated by the toxic chemical pesticides and herbicides that are relied on by “conventional” — industrial — farming; alternatives to using animals for medical and pharmaceutical research, and so on).
What moves you most in a work of literature?
The ability to create characters that become absolutely real so that you feel you know them. And which describe events — both current and historical — so that you become immersed in the world that is written about. (Which is why I love “Lord of the Rings.”)
Which genres do you especially enjoy reading? And which do you avoid?
Depends on my mood. Before the pandemic, when I had more time, I was reading books about World War II and the courage of those working underground in the resistance movements — especially in the German resistance. And books about the Holocaust and the horrors of the slave trade. Or fictitious novels by authors such as Barbara Pym and Graham Greene, or romantic fiction by authors such as Rosamunde Pilcher or Mary Wesley. When I am exhausted, these days — mostly audiobooks.
I avoid most science fiction — except John Wyndham, who wrote “The Day of the Triffids” and “The Midwich Cuckoos.”
How do you organize your books?
Sadly, though everything was once nicely organized, I have no time to organize, and everyone kindly sends me their books, and there are the books from my childhood, and my mother’s childhood. Then there are the books of two aunts and my sister and her family. The huge Bibles of my grandfather, a Congregational minister, even some medical books of my Uncle Eric. We cannot bear to part with them. There are books in shelves on all three floors of our family house, along three long passages, in heaps in the office (now a chaotic mess — no time — things get shoved in), on shelves, on the table and in piles on the floor. There are sometimes even books piled up on the stairs.
What book might people be surprised to find on your shelves?
If they examined the catholic nature of all the piles of books, there is nothing that would surprise them.
What kind of reader were you as a child? Which childhood books and authors stick with you most?
There was no TV when I was a child. I learned from books — and nature. I read every book about animals I could find. Doctor Dolittle and Tarzan led me to dream about living with animals in Africa. And I spent hours and hours learning from a wonderful “grown-up” book, recently republished: “The Miracle of Life,” which took one through evolution, the different animal species from primates to insects to plants, human anatomy and the history of medicine. I collected poetry books — I especially loved the Romantic poetry of Keats, Shelley, etc., and then the war poets like Rupert Brooke and Wilfred Owen. I loved some of Shakespeare’s plays. “Uncle Tom’s Cabin,” by Harriet Beecher Stowe, made a huge impression on me, so that I am passionate about racial discrimination and work to address it, even in a small way, by bringing young people together from different cultures in JGI’s Roots & Shoots environmental and humanitarian program for young people.
If you could require President Biden to read one book, what would it be?
I would not have presumed — but I asked someone connected with the Biden administration and he said that Biden is swamped daily in horrible news and that I should recommend my book (about to be published by Celadon) “The Book of Hope.” In which, prompted by the interviewer Doug Abrams, I outline my conviction that if we take action now we can turn things around. If we lose hope now — if the president of the United States loses hope — then we are doomed. We must get together and take action. Now, before it is too late.
You’re organizing a literary dinner party. Which three writers, dead or alive, do you invite?
Shakespeare, Tolkien, Jane Austen or Charlotte Brontë. Or, oh — I want Keats, Byron, Rachel Carson, Dickens, Darwin — and, oh, I so want Churchill and, and, and — my dinner party will need a banqueting hall to fit them all in!
What books are you embarrassed not to have read yet?
All the amazing books sent to me by those I respect deeply. If I go to a desert island with no internet and am allowed to take a big crate of these books with me! Or — horrors — a Kindle, as I probably could not afford the overweight charge of my crate.
What do you plan to read next?
No plans, no time. There are so very many books I want to read. Perhaps there’ll be more time postpandemic, when I can travel again and read on flights.
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How Books Led a Young Jane Goodall to Live Among the Chimps - The New York Times
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