GORILLAS IN THE MIST ** True First Edition, First Printing ** Signed By the Author

Dian Fossey

ISBN 10: 0395282179 / ISBN 13: 9780395282175

Published by Houghton Mifflin, Boston, 1983

***** This is the true first edition, first printing (with "10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1" stated on the copyright page). ***** This book is SIGNED by the author (Dian Fossey) on the title page. The author has not inscribed this book to anyone; it is just signed by the author. ***** Signed examples of this title are very rare. ***** Very nice hardcover with dust jacket. There is NO writing, NO bookplates, and NO remainder marks. It is NOT a book club edition and NOT a former library book. The dust jacket is NOT price-clipped ($19.95). CONDITION: The book is in FINE condition, and the dust jacket is in NEAR FINE condition. ***** We include new mylar (clear) dust jacket protectors with all books at no charge. ***** OUR GUARANTEE TO YOU: All books are guaranteed to be as described. We believe that no sale is complete until you are happy. Any book is returnable for a full refund (including postage) if you're not 100% satisfied. All books are packaged very carefully and shipped via USPS Mail with Delivery Confirmation. Thank you! Richard Vick, Modern First Editions (Buying and Selling Modern First Editions since 1982). Seller Inventory # 1307160137

Synopsis:

One of the most important books ever written about our connection to the natural world, GORILLAS IN THE MIST is the riveting account of Dian Fossey's thirteen years in a remote African rain forest with the greatest of the great apes. Fossey's extraordinary efforts to ensure the future of the rain forest and its remaining mountain gorillas are captured in her own words and in candid photographs of this fascinating endangered species. As only she could, Fossey combined her personal adventure story with groundbreaking scientific reporting in an unforgettable portrait of one of our closest primate relatives. Although Fossey's work ended tragically in her murder, GORILLAS IN THE MIST remains an invaluable testament to one of the longest-running field studies of primates and reveals her undying passion for her subject.

Review: In 1963, an occupational therapist from Kentucky, in uncertain health and spirits, traveled to central Africa in the quixotic hope of seeing a mountain gorilla in its natural habitat. Dian Fossey had read everything she could about the reclusive and much-feared animal, and she returned from her trip convinced that most of the books were wrong.

During her seven-week stay in Africa, Fossey had a chance encounter with the famed primatologists Mary and Louis Leakey, who encouraged her to follow her dream of living among the mountain gorillas and learning their ways. In 1967 she did just that, setting up a camp on the slopes of the 14,000-foot Virunga Volcanoes of Rwanda and studying four gorilla families there. Although it took them some time to accept Fossey's presence among them, she was immediately impressed by their peaceful nature and by their generous, guileless behavior--so unlike the images found in popular culture.

But, Fossey discovered, despite their peaceable way of life, the gorillas had many enemies in the form of poachers who hunted them for their hands, skins, and heads--ghastly remains sold to the tourist market. Much of Fossey's thoughtful but often rightly angry memoir Gorillas in the Mist is a well-reasoned plea for the protection of the gorillas and the suppression of the poachers' black market. That argument found a wide audience when her book was published in 1983, but Fossey's work remains unfinished: she was murdered, probably by those very poachers, in 1985, and today there are fewer than 650 mountain gorillas in the wild. To read Gorillas in the Mist is a first step for anyone concerned with their preservation, and that of other wild species everywhere. --Gregory McNamee

Bibliographic Details

Title: GORILLAS IN THE MIST ** True First Edition, ...
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin, Boston
Publication Date: 1983
Binding: Hardcover
Condition: Fine
Dust Jacket Condition: Near Fine
Signed: Signed by Author(s)
Edition: First Edition