The Serengeti's Great Migration [Bargain Price] [Hardcover]

Carlo Mari (Author), Harvey Croze (Author), Richard D. Estes (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 1900

The vast grasslands of the Serengeti and the golden plateau of the Masai Mara are a sanctuary for wildlife and the stage for one of the most extraordinary natural phenomena on earth: the wildebeast migration. The sheer scale of this event is both awesome and unimaginable--1,500,000 wildebeasts joined by hundreds of thousands of zebras, gazelles, elephants, and their predators.

Photographer Carlo Mari has followed these animals for ten years and watched them stampeding relentlessly from one horizon to another in vast unbroken columns. His photographs portray the dynamism and courage of the herds, their rhythms, their conquest of new spaces, and their struggle to live and perpetuate themselves. Set within the context of the whole of African wildlife, these images, accompanied by Harvey Croze's authoritative text, stretch beyond the migration itself and provide a glimpse into a journey without end, a perpetual circle of passage. A safari through the pages of this memorable book is the next best thing to being there.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Editorial Reviews

From the Publisher

The world's most astonishing wildlife migration is dramatically captured in 160 breathtaking duotone photographs. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

About the Author

Carlo Mari has long been fascinated with the land of Africa and the sea. His photographs have won numerous awards and have been featured in many books, including Underwater Life in the Mediterranean. Harvey Croze, a behaviorist and ecologist, has worked in Africa for three decades. He studied under the Nobel Laureate Professor Niko Tinbergen. His most recent work has been a revised edition of Pyramids of Life: A Study of the Ecosystem. Dr. Richard D. Estes is an Associate of mammalogy at the Museum of Comparative Zoology, Harvard University. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 256 pages
• Publisher: Abbeville Press (November 1900)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0789206692
• ASIN: B00013AX08
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,758,234 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars nothing less than a masterpiece, January 8, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: Serengeti's Great Migration (Hardcover)

Review in BBC Wildlife, January 2000, page 78 by BRIAN JACKMAN (writer) On the run The great migration of wildebeest zebras and gazelles across the high plains of East Africa's Serengeti-Mara ecosystem is the biggest wildlife show on Earth. Big subjects deserve a broad canvas, and this book is as big as they come - a coffee-table blockbuster whose wide-screen format is ideal for showing the huge Serengeti landscapes and awesome portraits of predators and prey. It is dominated by Carlo Mari's stunning photographs, and the fact that he has chosen to work entirely in black and white - reproduced here by using duotones on wonderfully thick ivory paper - only adds to the power of each printed image. The soft, grainy texture gives the action shots a quality akin to Renaissance paintings, except that instead of flights of angels we see zebras flying through clouds of dustand wildebeest crashing through torrents of spray as they race for their lives across the Mara River. But pictures alone cannot explain the mysteries of the great migration. That needs the words of experts - and the strength of this book is that the experts also happen to be the finest of wordsmiths. The cover carries a glowing message from Peter Matthiessen. The foreword is by Richard D Estes, whose own books on African mammals are essential reading for every safari enthusiast, and the main text is by Harvey Croze, distinguished- author of Pyramids of Life. With Croze as guide, the reader is taken on a 500km round trip from the wildebeest's ancestral calving grounds in the southern Serengeti to their dry-season refuge in the Masai Mara - a circuit as old as Africa itself. Along the way, everything is explained in lucid and informative style, with the occasional dash of dry humour for good measure. All the key players are featured, from those species which make up what Croze calls the "guild of predators" down to the fine print of the Serengeti grasses and the parasites which probably kill more wildebeest than all the predators put together. The result is nothing less than a masterpiece, a celebration of the natural world in all its diversity. If you can't actually go to Africa to see the great migration in the flesh, this book really is the next best thing.

5.0 out of 5 stars powerful prose - inspiring photos, July 7, 2007

By 

J. Shah (NJ, USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Serengeti's Great Migration (Hardcover)

The author uses excellent language to describe the Gnu's migration from southern Serengeti to Masai Mara and back, through four seasons. The book is chockful of insightful numbers, interesting facts, and mesmerizing description of the Gnu, grasses, predators, and behavior. The monochrome photographs are superb, leaving ample room for our own imagination to vicariously roam the Serengeti. Excellent reading, whether you are visiting Serengeti or an armchair naturalist.