Concerned about the possible demise of the Gulf Stream, Érik Orsenna read, investigated, interviewed experts, and traveled from the violent swirls off the coast of Florida to the maelstroms of Norway to better understand this most important of ocean currents. Part homage, part investigation, A Portrait of the Gulf Stream allows readers to join him on a voyage of discovery. From writing about the sea as varied as that of Socrates and Hemingway to scientific theory both ancient and modern, we discover the secrets of this most powerful and mysterious current. Érik Orsenna is a Goncourt Prize–winning novelist and one of the forty "immortals" of the Académie Française, where he holds the seat formerly held by Commander Jacques-Yves Cousteau.