Insect Lives: Stories of Mystery and Romance from a Hidden World

by Erich Hoyt, Ted Schultz

Insects inhabit an often unexamined microcosmos, pursuing lives that are often strange beyond our wildest imaginings. From the dawn of humanity, our six-legged fellow Earthlings have repelled and enthralled us. Humans have exterminated, eaten, domesticated, and even excommunicated insects. We collect them, we curse them, and we have penned a surprising body of literature about them. Insect Stories of Mystery and Romance from a Hidden World offers an entertaining and informative survey of the human fascination, dreadful and otherwise, with insects diabolical and divine, from accounts in the Bible and Aristotle to the writings of Charles Darwin and the great nineteenth-century naturalists sending home accounts from the rain forest. Highlighted here are observations from E. O. Wilson, Jean-Henri Fabré, David Quammen, May Berenbaum, Roger Swain, William Wordsworth, A. S. Byatt, Gary Larson and more than sixty other writers who tell of the mystery and romance of that other, hidden world beneath our feet and beyond our rolled-up newspapers.

Genres: Nonfiction, Science, Nature

368 pages, Paperback

First published October 18, 1999

About the author

Erich Hoyt has spent much of his life on or near the sea, working with whales and dolphins and marine conservation. An award-winning author, he has written or co-written 25 books and hundreds of magazine articles on whales, dolphins, as well as the deep sea, ants, insects, wild plants and other subjects.

His latest books include Planktonia (2022, 176pp, 150+ photos) and Strange Sea Creatures (2021), both of which offer a deep dive into the new species scientists are discovering in the ocean, some of them no larger than a fingernail. In 2019, he produced an expanded, updated edition of his best-selling Orca: The Whale Called Killer, lavishly illustrated with 90 all new photos, illustrations and maps. Before those books, Encyclopedia of Whales, Dolphins and Porpoises (2017) chronicled the 40-year revolution in whale research with first-hand stories and insights into the lives of these highly social, intelligent mammals and the drive to save their habitat. Other books include the award-winning Creatures of the Deep (2014) and Weird Sea Creatures (2013) — both of which explored the frontiers of the deep sea with state of the art photography and tales of bizarre new species.

Erich is currently Research Fellow with WDC, Whale and Dolphin Conservation in the UK. For the past 20 years, he has jointly directed the first killer whale (orca) study in eastern Russia (in Kamchatka), an international collaboration with Russian scientists. The project won the prestigious Klüh Prize for Innovation in Science ($10,000 prize) from Germany. Erich is also a member of the International Committee on Marine Mammal Protected Areas and co-chair of the IUCN Marine Mammal Protected Area Task Force.

Erich has authored numerous conservation and scientific papers and reports as a consultant and advisor for international conservation groups and governments and is considered an authority on whales and dolphins, marine-protected areas and marine conservation, whale watching and ecotourism. He has given talks in Japan, Russia, Indonesia, Taiwan, Iceland, Mexico, Chile, Canada, U.S., Germany and the Caribbean. He has also taught as a visiting lecturer at the Ohio State University, the University of Edinburgh, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

Erich’s magazine and newspaper credits include: National Geographic, Natural History, Geographical, New Scientist, Canadian Geographic, The Sunday Times (London), The Guardian, The New York Times, Hakai, Defenders, International Wildlife. Twice a James Thurber Writer-in-Residence, and a Vannevar Bush Fellow at MIT and Harvard in 1985-86, he has 15 magazine and book awards including the Outstanding Book of the Year Award from the American Society of Journalists & Authors, Inc., in New York (2002) and the Choice selection as one of its Outstanding Academic Books (2012).

Three of his adult nonfiction books, The Earth Dwellers, Insect Lives and Orca: The Whale Called Killer, have been optioned for films. His books for children (age 10+) include Weird Sea Creatures, Whale Rescue, Meeting the Whales and Riding with the Dolphins (all published by Firefly Books) and Extinction A-Z. His books have been published in 15 languages in 25 countries.

A dual Canadian-American citizen, Erich lives in Dorset, England, with his wife and four children.

Reviews

[Barb · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ugh! Finally finished! It took a long time to read this compilation of essays, not because I don't find the study of insects interesting; after all, they are ubiquitous, have been around far longer than humans and will no doubt outlast us. But the collection is uneven. Some of the selections were fascinating and thought-provoking, others just made me squirm and worse, some made me yawn.

Random fact in appreciation of mosquitos: they are our best hope for survival of the tropical rainforests, by making them virtually uninhabitable - Essay by David Quammen.

[Madelynn · Rating 3 out of 5]

Keeping in mind that this is an anthology of multiple writers on a variety of insects, I think this was an interesting and informative read. All insects have interesting qualities that have been written about from research perspectives, poetically and as works of fiction. This has a little bit of everything, and does skew more toward ants and bees as social insects. Some pieces were more challenging to read than others because they are older and the language was a little dated, such as pieces from Darwin and Aristotle. I recommend looking into it if you want to learn more about a class of animals that is often feared or underappreciated to see their beauty and human fascination with them.

[Craig · Rating 4 out of 5]

Quite a long read, yet this collection of essays, mostly from naturalists of 50-150 years ago, offers an interesting look into lives of these other inhabitants of our world.

[dejah_thoris · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a very strange book, namely a collection of excerpts from nature writers on various insects. (No spiders though because they're arachnids and therefore too cool for this collection.) If you REALLY like bugs, I recommend reading it because there are some neat pieces that will entertain you and others that will make you gasp in awe. There is a huge bias towards ants, bees, and butterflies, but neat excerpts about balloon flies, earwigs, and mites too. (The squeamish should skip the section on culinary uses for insects.) Most of the excerpts are light reading but some are VERY scientific, which I found distracting when combined with the other selections. Overall, a great book if you want to learn random facts and impressions about insects or get an idea of what nature writing is like.

[sardit · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is a wide-ranging collection of short essays about insects. Quite a lot of it falls into into the type of nature writing that most bores me - trite observations all dressed up with poetic ambitions of mostly poor quality, offered by people who think staring into a garden is the same as peering into their soul. But there were a few in there that genuinely interested me, and quite a lot of them where I learned something. I was particularly enamored of the story of the pet mud dauber. So I can't entirely dislike it, though it seems most suited to people who enjoy nature writing and want a collection of very short essays to read at random intervals.

[Patreesha · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fun read for those who enjoy nature. Each writer has their own voice and their own take on the insect world. I read this book as I had met the man who writes about mites that live in the ears of moths -- Asher Treat. To learn of another's passion can open one up to a new perspective.

[Elisa M · Rating 4 out of 5]

I finally finished this book- I've been reading it for almost a year now, but that's OK, I knew it would take some time. Even though I only 3-star enjoyed the book, I had to up it to 4 stars because it's such an interesting concept and so unlike anything I've read before.

[Dennis Littrell · Rating 5 out of 5]

A cornucopia of creepy-crawlies

This is a beautifully and cleverly edited eclectic collection of stories, articles, poems, scientific treatises, and even cartoons about insects. There are quaint stories from the eighteenth century, studious articles from the nineteenth, and modern selections from such twentieth century experts as Edward O. Wilson, Roger B. Swain. Karl von Frisch, May Berenbaum, Harold Oldroyd and others. Charles Darwin is represented, Aristotle, Alfred Russel Wallace, Thoreau, even the Bible makes an appearance. There are selections from a novella, A.S. Byatt's "Morpho Eugenia"; poems, Wordsworth's "To a Butterfly," Robert Burns's "To a Louse"; and even a bit of a movie, THEM! (1954). Obviously, editors, Hoyt and Schultz are as intent at entertaining as informing. You'll find dozens of different insects here, from house flies and ants to dung beetles and glow-worms to ticks, wasps, silverfish, etc. Each selection is presented with a short note from the editors and followed by a bibliographical entry. There is an index of authors and one of subjects. The selections are collected under various heading, e.g., "Insects Praised," "Insects Reviled," "Insect Architecture," etc. The sheer breath of insect behavior presented here is unnerving: How multifarious are the realities of life! Noteworthy is the meticulous care taken with the editing and proofreading. This is a good and a strange read.

--Dennis Littrell, author of “The World Is Not as We Think It Is”

[Melissa Helton · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very interesting to zoom in on this world we don't have access to otherwise. Good span across history and the insect world.

[Suzanne · Rating 2 out of 5]

The utmost most detail that often went way beyond my interest.

[John · Rating 4 out of 5]

All your favorite entomologists of history and the modern day wax creepy about the weirdest insect behavior they're comfortable writing about.

Past the very detailed explanations of for instance, those mites that will only go into a moth's ear if the other ear is unoccupied, there's much more on group behavior - at what point does a colony of non-self sufficient, non-reproducing ants stop becoming many individuals, and behave identically to a collective organism?

[Salman Khan · Rating 4 out of 5]

not yet read..

[Vasha7 · Rating 4 out of 5]

An amazingly rich source of good writing and interesting observations.