Nature Notes Vol. 4 : The Natural Selection

Dust jacket complete, unclipped, tiny closed tears. Colour illustrated boards. No ownership inscription. Colour cartoon illustrations. 111 pages clean and tight. This is the fourth collection of Peter Brookes' satirically and artistically brilliant Nature Notes series. Brookes' award-winning political cartoons, which appear in The Times on Saturday, are some of the most biting and astute drawings of their time. In Nature Notes: The Natural Selection, Brookes covers the months from October 2001 to May 2004 - a time of cataclysmic change in world affairs. Beginning with Bush's war in Afghanistan, he mercilessly parodies the US administration as it marches towards its War on Terror. The red-necked grebe, genus name Dubya texassa, is a creature with a distinctive call of `warr, warr', whose search for a mate across the pond is answered by the brown-nosed grebe, genus name Blairus demeansus, calling `yessir, yessir'. Brookes goes on to describe acutely the manoeuvres towards the attacks on Iraq, as the Dogs of War circle, including the US bloodhound and the poodle: `Essentially dumb and, at bottom, touchingly close to one another: There is also revealing commentary on events closer to home. Westminster stalwarts become a collection of nuts (Cherie Blair is Not-so-Sweet Chestnut - Terrorista simpatico); Ken Livingstone is a newt - pissedasanewtus; Iain Duncan Smith metamorphoses into the Hardly Ever Spotted Moth; and Gordon Brown is the Famous Grouse - `Not yet the premier choice. Plump but bitter and sour.' The fourth volume of Nature Notes is an endlessly entertaining, superbly perceptive portrait of three years' worth of events at home and abroad - Wars on Terror, the oscillating fortunes of the New Labour government, its (lack of) Opposition, struggles with and within Europe - as well as a hilarious succession of incisive character studies. Size: Obl 4to.…