Whale Nation
1988
First Published
4.12
Average Rating
192
Number of Pages
2-Time Award-Winner! 1996 AudioFile Earphones Award 1995 Talkies Award • Best Poetry 'Leviathan... Upon earth there is not his like, who is made without fear. Will he speak soft words unto thee?' Job 41 Whale Nation is a hymn to the beauty, intelligence and majesty of the largest mammal on earth. A 'green classic' read with natural resonance by its author, it rarely fails to strike a chord in the heart of those concerned with the abuse of our planet. It is joined by additional content devoted to a fascinating account of whale history. Music: Mendelssohn, Holst, Bach, Mozart, Brahms, Debussy, Ciurlionis, The Song of the Humpback Whale
Avg Rating
4.12
Number of Ratings
145
5 STARS
45%
4 STARS
30%
3 STARS
19%
2 STARS
3%
1 STARS
2%
goodreads
Author
Heathcote Williams
Author · 6 books
John Henley Jasper Heathcote-Williams was an English poet, actor and award-winning playwright. He was also an intermittent painter, sculptor and long-time conjuror. After his schooldays at Eton, he hacksawed his surname's double-barrel to become Heathcote Williams, a moniker more in keeping perhaps with his new-found persona. His father, also named Heathcote Williams, was a lawyer. He is perhaps best known for the book-length polemical poem Whale Nation, which in 1988 became "the most powerful argument for the newly instigated worldwide ban on whaling." In the early 1970s his agitational graffiti were a feature on the walls of the then low-rent end of London's Notting Hill district. From his early twenties, Williams has enjoyed a minor cult following. His first book, The Speakers (1964), a virtuoso close-focus account of life at Speakers' Corner in Hyde Park, was greeted with unanimous critical acclaim. In 1974 it was successfully adapted for the stage by the Joint Stock Theatre Company.
