Ecology: For Many a Spring

To an admiring friend, Rachel Carson, 56, was "a nun of nature, a votary of all outdoors." She also had a rare gift for transmuting scientific fact into lucid, lyrical language. Yet it was only in 1951, after 15 years with the Fish and Wildlife Service—much of the time as editor in chief of its publications—that she published her famous book The Sea Around Us. It was written in hypnotic, susurrant prose; it brimmed with intriguing knowledge; and for a book aimed at a popular audience, it was hard to fault scientifically....