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Lords and Lemurs: Mad Scientists, Kings with Spears, and the Survival of Diversity in Madagascar
by Jolly, Alison
- Used
- Fine
- Hardcover
- first
- Condition
- Fine/Fine
- ISBN 10
- 0618367519
- ISBN 13
- 9780618367511
- Seller
-
Santa Barbara, California, United States
Payment Methods Accepted
About This Item
Boston and New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2004. vi, 310 pages, [24] pages of plates, illustrations (some colour), map; 24 cm. Tight, clean copy. Fine DJ. A fine copy of the first printing. "In the extreme south of Madagascar is a place called Berenty, where Tandroy tribesmen, French lords, mad scientists, and two or three species of lemurs may be found gathered peacefully under a tamarind tree. Forty years ago Alison Jolly went to Berenty to study lemurs, and she has been enthralled by it ever since. In Lords and Lemurs she tells the story of the place, its people, and its other animals." - Publisher. CONTENTS: Lemurs just behind their houses; Meow! Sifaka! Pig-grunt-grunt-grunt-grunt: lemurs and lemur-watchers, 90,000,000 B.C. to 2000 A.D.; He wanted the whole forest!: The de Heaulmes and the Tandroy, 1660-1940; I licked his feet very heartily: the Tandroy and their English slave, 1703-17I7; I begged my grandmother to tell the governor-general: famine, war, and revolution, 1940-1948; Me? I'm a lathe operator: the golden fibers, 1948-1960; A very cheap wife: Chantal and Fenistina and me, 1963-1975; If we hear they hurt you, we will come back with our spears: Malagasy socialism, 1971-1979; Our country is committing suicide: debt, conservation, and the bank, 1980-1992; SOS: save our south!: Famine, 1991-1992; Here the children inherit: Berenty, 2000; "This is anything but idiot. This is whole": funeral at the Lucky Baobab, 2000; Epilogue: 2002, 2003.. 1st. Hardcover. Fine/Fine. 8vo. Collectible.
Synopsis
In the extreme south of Madagascar is a place called Berenty, where Tandroy tribesmen, French lords, mad scientists, and two or three species of lemurs may be found gathered peacefully under a tamarind tree. Forty years ago Alison Jolly went to Berenty to study lemurs, and she has been enthralled by it ever since. In Lords and Lemurs she tells the story of the place, its people, and its other animals. The owner of Berenty, Jean de Heaulme, arrived there in 1928 as a six-month-old baby, riding with his mother in the sidecar of his father's Harley-Davidson motorcycle. The de Heaulme family has lived at Berenty ever since, supporting Madagascar's fight for independence from France, serving in the government, and enduring economic turmoil, civil war, and even imprisonment. Although they are relics of a colonial system that seized land and tortured dissidents, the de Heaulmes also epitomize noblesse oblige in the best sense of the phrase, showing a remarkable sense of responsibility for both the people and the ecosystem of Berenty. Early on they set aside a large portion of their estate as a nature preserve, where lemurs and other animals have thrived over the years. Jean de Heaulme became a blood brother to one of the local Tandroy nobles -- the kings with spears. Traditionally the Tandroy were warriors who raided for women, cattle, and slaves. Now those who live at Berenty can take what they need from the modern world -- medical care, education, and a cash income -- without giving up their own customs and way of life. Many Tandroy still live in traditional villages surrounded by walls of thorn, and even the men who hold salaried jobs work hard so they can return to their clan with enough cattle to buy a bride or two. When a clan elder dies, the family offers a grandiose funeral where, amid gunfire and dancing and merrymaking and sex, a whole herd of zebu cattle is sacrificed to honor the new Ancestor -- even if he happens to be a Christian. Alison Jolly and her husband were honored to be invited to attend a Tandroy funeral. Poignant and colorful, tragic and funny, Lords and Lemurs is a remarkable tale of one of the last great places on earth and the extraordinary people who live there, a tale of marriage, birth, and death, of spear fights and stink fights and dancing. It shows how human warmth and dignity can reach out beyond any social system.
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Details
- Bookseller
- LEFT COAST BOOKS
(US)
- Bookseller's Inventory #
- 111507
- Title
- Lords and Lemurs: Mad Scientists, Kings with Spears, and the Survival of Diversity in Madagascar
- Author
- Jolly, Alison
- Format/Binding
- Hardcover
- Book Condition
- Used - Fine
- Jacket Condition
- Fine
- Edition
- 1st
- ISBN 10
- 0618367519
- ISBN 13
- 9780618367511
- Publisher
- Houghton Mifflin Company
- Place of Publication
- Boston and New York
- Date Published
- 2004
- Size
- 8vo
- Keywords
- COLLECTIBLE
- Bookseller catalogs
- XXX / COLLECTIBLES;
Terms of Sale
LEFT COAST BOOKS
30 day return guarantee, with full refund including original shipping costs for up to 30 days after delivery if an item arrives misdescribed or damaged.
About the Seller
LEFT COAST BOOKS
Biblio member since 2016
Santa Barbara, California
About LEFT COAST BOOKS
Established in Santa Barbara, California, in 2004, Left Coast Books specializes in ART BOOKS, offering thousands of titles on painting, sculpture, graphic arts, architecture, design, photography, film, video, and performance art. We also sell classics, literature, history, and a broad variety of useful academic books.
Glossary
Some terminology that may be used in this description includes:
- Tight
- Used to mean that the binding of a book has not been overly loosened by frequent use.
- New
- A new book is a book previously not circulated to a buyer. Although a new book is typically free of any faults or defects, "new"...
- Fine
- A book in fine condition exhibits no flaws. A fine condition book closely approaches As New condition, but may lack the...
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