The Unexpected Universe

by Loren Eiseley

  1944

  Mabel, diagnosed with breast cancer, undergoes a radical mastectomy and radiation treatment. In May, accepts an offer to serve as a professor in the department of sociology at Oberlin College in Ohio; moves to Oberlin with Mabel in October.

  1945

  Teaches over the summer at the University of Pennsylvania. Becomes friendly with writer and photographer Wright Morris, a downstairs neighbor, who nicknames him “Schmerzie” (a diminutive of Weltschmerz), making light of his tendency to melancholia. Shares work in progress with Morris. Publishes essays “Myth and Mammoth in Archaeology” in American Antiquity and “There Were Giants” in Prairie Schooner.

  1946

  Is awarded tenure at Oberlin. Teaches over the summer at Columbia University. In November receives a grant of $3,500 from The Viking Fund for “A Survey and Investigation of Researches on Early Man in South Africa”; plans extensive travel, intending to visit South African anthropologists, museum collections, and archaeological sites.

  1947

  In January is appointed Professor of Anthropology at the University of Pennsylvania and assumes chairmanship of his department; with Mabel, rents a small apartment in suburban Rose Valley, outside Philadelphia. Works with Froelich Rainey, newly appointed director of the University Museum, to restore long-strained ties between the Museum and the Department of Anthropology; is named curator of early man at the Museum. Postpones South African trip after he learns that a group from the University of California will soon be en route with similar objectives; hopes to revise his itinerary and sail in a year.

  1948

  Travels to Oaxaca, Mexico, in the fall after human skeletal remains are unearthed near those of an ancient elephant, a potentially significant discovery that ultimately proves less important than it appears. Abandons South African travel plans, citing “the unsettled state of both departmental and family affairs.” Suffers from partial deafness after an ear infection in the fall, recovering about six months later. Comes to an informal agreement with Harper & Brothers to publish a collection of essays; works with editor Jack Fischer. Presents paper on “Providence and the Death of Species” at meeting of the American Anthropological Association in December, in Toronto.

  1949

  Teaches at Berkeley over the summer, afterward traveling to Wyoming, near Cody, where he investigates a distinctive arrowhead site. Moves with Mabel to a new apartment in Wynnewood, a prosperous suburb on the Philadelphia Main Line. In September is elected president of the newly formed American Institute of Human Paleontology, after a meeting of leading physical anthropologists in New York, which he attends. Publishes “The Fire Apes” in Harper’s; tells Ray Bradbury, who writes him in praise of the essay, that he is “contemplating doing a book.”

  1950

  Delivers a eulogy for Frank Speck after his death on February 7.

  1951

  Toward the end of the year, travels briefly to England to arrange for the university museum’s acquisition of an important collection of plaster casts of paleontological specimens.

  1952

  Accepts a commission from the American Philosophical Society to write a book on the reception of Darwin’s ideas in America, to be published on the centennial of the first edition of On the Origin of Species, in 1959. Helps the Society build its Darwin collections, locating books and manuscripts for acquisition. (Wright Morris occasionally accompanies him on buying trips.) Wife Mabel takes part-time job as secretary to the director of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, in subsequent years becoming an associate director of that institution. Begins a year’s leave with fellowship support to work on a book about “the philosophical implications of human evolution.”

  1953

  In July, meets with Jack Fischer to discuss essay collection.

  1954

  Essay “Man the Firemaker” appears in Scientific American in September.

  1955

  After discussions at the American Philosophical Society, abandons plans for a book on Darwinism in America, and agrees in December to edit two volumes of the letters of Darwin and his contemporaries. (Subsequently renegotiates this commitment, and instead of the proposed volumes works intensely on a book about the history of evolution tentatively titled “The Time Voyagers,” solicited by Doubleday editor Jason Epstein.)

  1956

  Early in the year, meets with Hiram Haydn, editor-in-chief at Random House, who persuades him to work with the firm on a book gathering his essays; proposes to call it “The Great Deeps.” Begins a year’s sabbatical in September, freeing him to advance his American Philosophical Society publication projects. Presents Haydn with a manuscript of his essay collection, now titled “The Crack in the Absolute,” on November 13; they ultimately agree on the title The Immense Journey. Readers for the press recommend substantial revisions to Eiseley’s initial submission.

  1957

  In January, meets with Haydn in Philadelphia to discuss alterations to The Immense Journey; rewrites and reorganizes it, dropping several essays. Submits a manuscript of “The Time Voyagers” to Doubleday in June. The Immense Journey is published on August 26; travels to New York for radio interviews about the book. Joins editorial board of The American Scholar.

  1958

  Proposes to edit an anthology of naturalists’ writings for Random House; at a meeting in New York in February, Haydn convinces him instead to sign a contract for a second book of his own essays. “The Time Voyagers,” now titled Darwin’s Century: Evolution and the Men Who Discovered It, is published by Doubleday in July.

  1959

  Darwin’s Century wins Phi Beta Kappa science prize. Is appointed provost of the University of Pennsylvania in October; quickly realizes he has overcommitted himself. Mother dies on November 29. Delivers six public lectures at the College of Medicine of the University of Cincinnati.

  1960

  Publishes The Firmament of Time, gathering his University of Cincinnati lectures.

  1961

  In March, delivers the Montgomery Lectures on Contemporary Civilization at the University of Nebraska, addressing the life and significance of Francis Bacon on the four hundredth anniversary of his birth. On April 3, is awarded the John Burroughs Medal for The Firmament of Time. Resigns as provost in April, and in the fall becomes a fellow of the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences, in Palo Alto.

  1962

  Aunt Grace dies on January 17. In February, gives the fifth annual lecture of the John Dewey Society, in Chicago; it is published eight months later by Harper & Row, titled The Mind as Nature. Visits New York in June, meeting with editors and publishers. Returning to Penn in July, is named University Professor in the Life Sciences.

  1963

  Francis Bacon and the Modern Dilemma, an expanded version of his 1961 Nebraska lectures, is published on January 15. Delivers address “The Divine Animal” on May 22, at a New York meeting of the National Institute of Arts and Letters. Accepts a position as director of the new Richard Prentice Ettinger Program for Creative Writing at Rockefeller University; on June 27, at ceremonies inaugurating the program, gives address “The Illusion of Two Cultures.”

  1964

  Is awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in April, enabling a year’s leave of absence from Penn. Hires Caroline E. Werkley as his administrative assistant, to oversee the affairs of the Ettinger Program; she remains his assistant for the rest of his life. In November is relieved of his duties as Ettinger director, charged with neglecting them. Named to President’s Task Force on the Preservation of Natural Beauty, travels to Washington, D.C., for a press conference, and meets with Lyndon Johnson.

  1965

  Addresses the Nebraska Academy of Sciences in April, on “The Inner Galaxy: A Prelude to Space.”

  1966

  Gives address “Man, Time, and Prophecy” at the University of Kansas Centennial Celebration in April. Serves as host and narrator of Animal Secrets, an NBC television series that airs for about eighteen months.<
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  1967

  Vacations on Sanibel Island in Florida in February. Spends the fall semester at the University of Wisconsin, where he has been appointed Johnson Research Professor. Tours the countryside around Madison with Walter Hamady, an assistant professor of art and the proprietor of The Perishable Press, who proposes to publish some of Eiseley’s works in an illustrated limited edition.

  1968

  In Dallas at a December meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, gives an interview to the Dallas Morning News in which he questions the value of the space program, given its immense cost; many criticize his remarks.

  1969

  Spends three winter weeks in Aruba with Mabel; later in the year, she retires from her position at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. Delivers a series of lectures at the University of Washington in Seattle in the fall. The Unexpected Universe is published in October to widely positive reviews. Receives copies of The Brown Wasps, a collection of three essays published in a limited edition by Walter Hamady at The Perishable Press; “the books are beautiful,” he writes Hamady. Begins a novel, never completed, titled “The Snow Wolf.”

  1970

  On February 21, The New Yorker publishes a warmly favorable review by W. H. Auden of The Unexpected Universe; Eiseley and Auden subsequently correspond, and meet for lunch. The Unexpected Universe is nominated for a National Book Award. Invitation to deliver the commencement address at Kent State is cancelled by the university after the shooting of four students on May 4. Receives honorary doctor of science degree from St. Lawrence University in New York, one of many such honors. The Invisible Pyramid is published in October.

  1971

  Elected to the National Institute of Arts and Letters. The Night Country is published November 10.

  1972

  Suffers from viral pneumonia during the fall. In November publishes Notes of an Alchemist, a book of poems, with Scribner’s; receives a note of praise from Auden, who asks permission to dedicate a poem to Eiseley.

  1973

  The Man Who Saw Through Time, a revised and expanded edition of Francis Bacon and the Modern Dilemma, is published by Scribner’s in April. Over the summer spends ten days with Froelich Rainey of the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology at Penn, doing archaeological fieldwork in Dawson County, Montana. Visits Walden Pond and Thoreau’s grave in Masssachusetts; considers writing a book about Thoreau and discusses the project with Scribner’s. The Innocent Assassins, a second collection of poetry, appears in October.

  1974

  On September 18, at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., is presented with the Distinguished Nebraskan Award. Toward the end of the year, begins working intensively on a long-postponed volume of autobiography; it is initially titled “The Other Player.”

  1975

  Publishes his autobiography, All the Strange Hours: The Excavation of a Life, in October.

  1976

  Sits for a portrait bust by sculptor Kappy Wells. Learns after routine prostate surgery in September that doctors have discovered a malignant bile duct tumor.

  1977

  Undergoes a pancreatectomy on January 27, returning home at the end of March. Receives galleys for Another Kind of Autumn, a book of poems to be published by Scribner’s. Dictates a letter to Scribner’s proposing an outline of the contents of his last book, published posthumously by Times Books as The Star Thrower. Returns to the hospital in June, his tumor having returned. Dies on July 9.

  Note on the Text

  This e-Book, taken from the first of a two-volume set, Collected Essays on Evolution, Nature, and the Cosmos, by Loren Eiseley—presents the complete text of The Unexpected Universe (1969). The second volume in the set presents The Invisible Pyramid (1970), The Night Country (1971), and essays gathered posthumously in The Star Thrower (1978). The text included here has been taken from the first printings.

  In 1964, Eiseley followed his editor Hiram Haydn from Atheneum to Harcourt, Brace, signing contracts to produce a volume of autobiography and a new collection of essays. By September 1967, however, he confessed that he was encountering “a certain blockage” in his progress on both projects. (“Like the veriest amateur,” he complained to William Jovanovich at Harcourt, “I have gone dry and am waiting for inspiration.”) The autobiography seemed an impossible task, and he offered to return his advance. The essays, scheduled for publication in 1968, would need to be delayed by a year.

  When Eiseley finally submitted a manuscript of The Unexpected Universe in February 1969, Haydn and Jovanovich both quickly reassured him that it had been worth the wait; they sought no significant alteration to the contents and made plans for a large initial printing. Eiseley took advantage of the considerable editorial control Haydn yielded to him, carefully reviewing proofs and even helping to draft the text on the dust jacket. He is not known to have been involved in the preparation of an English edition of The Unexpected Universe, published by Victor Gollancz in London in 1970.

  Further information on the composition and publication history of individual essays in The Unexpected Universe is provided in the list below.

  “The Ghost Continent.” Incorporates material from “The Odyssean Voyage in Science and Literature,” a lecture presented at the Dallas meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, on December 26, 1968; a section appeared in Science on July 11, 1969, as “Activism and the Rejection of History.” First published in its entirety in The Unexpected Universe.

  “The Unexpected Universe.” Rejected early titles included “The Mutable Cloud” and “Man, Nature, and Science.” Presented as the fifth annual Grady Gammadge lecture at Arizona State University, February 8, 1966, under the title “Science and the Unexpected Universe,” and published under the same title in The American Scholar, Summer 1966.

  “The Hidden Teacher.” Incorporates material from “Thoughts Provoked on the Nature of Man by a Visit to the Fair,” an unpublished manuscript written for a 1964 Time, Inc. World’s Fair souvenir book. Other draft titles included “Man: The Listener in the Web” and “The Fair and the Dreamer.” Presented as a lecture on several occasions from 1965 to 1968. Published for the first time in The Unexpected Universe.

  “The Star Thrower.” First published in The Unexpected Universe.

  “The Angry Winter.” Draft titles included “The Doorway of Snow,” “The Antagonist,” and “The Lost Door.” Presented as a lecture at Stanford University in October 1966 and at the University of Wisconsin in November 1967. Published as “Man Is an Orphan of the Angry Winter,” Life, February 16, 1968, and in shortened form as “The Night the Shadows Whispered,” Reader’s Digest, May 1968.

  “The Golden Alphabet.” Early versions were titled “The Forfeit Paradise” and “The Forfeit Paradise: Darwin and Thoreau.” Presented as a lecture on several occasions in 1968. First published in The Unexpected Universe.

  “The Invisible Island.” Draft titles included “The Isle of Voices,” “Man: The Invisible Island,” “The Rent in the Curtain,” and “The Living Screen.” First published in The Unexpected Universe.

  “The Inner Galaxy.” Draft titles included “The Bright Stranger: A History of Love,” “New End for Inner Galaxy,” “A Prelude to Space,” “The Inner Galaxy: A Prelude to Space,” and “Man Looks at Man.” Presented as a lecture on numerous occasions from 1964 to 1969. First published in The Unexpected Universe.

  “The Innocent Fox.” Published in Natural History, October 1969.

  “The Last Neanderthal.” A draft is titled “The Season of the Leaves.” First published in The Unexpected Universe.

  The text of The Unexpected Universe in the present volume has been taken from the Harcourt Brace Jovanovich first printing of October 8, 1969.

  This eBook presents the text chosen for inclusion here, but it does not attempt to reproduce features of their typographic design, such as the display capitalization of chapter openings. The text is reprinted without change, except for the c
orrection of typographical errors. Spelling, punctuation, and capitalization are often expressive features, and they are not altered, even when inconsistent or irregular. The following is a list of typographical errors corrected, cited by page and line number: 272.25, exceeds; 403.4, Quarternary.

  Notes

  In the notes below, the reference numbers denote page and line of the print edition (the line count includes chapter headings but not blank lines). No note is generally made for material included in standard desk-reference works. Quotations from Shakespeare are keyed to The Riverside Shakespeare, ed. G. Blakemore Evans (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1974), and biblical references to the King James Version. For further information about Eiseley’s life and works, and references to other studies, see Gale E. Christianson, Fox at the Wood’s Edge: A Biography of Loren Eiseley (New York: Henry Holt, 1990); Peter Heidtmann, Loren Eiseley: A Modern Ishmael (Hamden, CT: Archon Books, 1991); Tom Lynch and Susan N. Maher, eds., Artifacts and Illuminations: Critical Essays on Loren Eiseley (Lincoln: University of Nebraska, 2012); and Mary Ellen Pitts, Toward a Dialogue of Understandings: Loren Eiseley and the Critique of Science (Bethlehem, PA: Lehigh University Press, 1995).

  242.1–3 The universe . . . HALDANE] See “Possible Worlds” in Haldane’s Possible Worlds and Other Essays (1927).

  242.4–6 If you do not . . . HERACLITUS] See fragment 7 of Heraclitus’s “On Nature” (c. 535–475 B.C.E.).

  243.3–5 The winds . . . BURTON] See “Democritus Junior, to the Reader,” an introductory section of Burton’s Anatomy of Melancholy (1621).

  246.2–3 the words of Kazantzakis . . . heart.”] See Kazantzakis’s The Odyssey: A Modern Sequel (1938), book 13, line 1218.

  246.31–33 It was once . . . winds.”] See Eratosthenes’s Geography (c. 245–40 B.C.E.), book 1.

  249.8–10 Cook . . . high latitude.”] From Cook’s journals, March 31, 1770.