Filled with wit and wisdom, The Courtship of Sea Creatures is a playful meditation on the sexual strategies of sea life found along the shores of Brittany. The author arrives at the coast with a heightened awareness of every dank odor, the slightest rustle of the water on the sand, and the changing light of the vast sky. Thrusting his hands into a transparent tidal pool, he is off on another round of observations. His viewpoint is ironic, witty, poetic and wise. He finds sea urchins in congregations of "indifferent promiscuity." He describes the melancholy of lobsters, who must mate in "armor," and the reverie of a mussel in her shell as she dreams "in the heart of a set and oblong darkness." In a final scene on the beach, he shares an intense, sexually charged moment with a woman as they open and ingest some of these sea creatures, which have been the object of his scrutiny, the subject of his musings, and the inspiration of his poetic language. This dramatic moment brings us face to face with the universal drive to mate shared by all living creatures. 99 pages. 8vo - over 7¾" - 9¾" tall.

MARINE ALGAE ANIMALS ANIMAL BEHAVIOR