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Birds, Sex and Beauty
- Author
- Matt Ridley
- Narrator
- Matt Ridley
- Publisher
- HarperCollins Publishers
- Publish Date
- 13 March 2025
- Run Time
- 11 hours 32 minutes
- Format
- x-book®
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What to expect
In his new book, acclaimed science writer Matt Ridley looks to the peculiar mating rituals of birds to better understand the rich origins and ongoing significance of Darwin's sexual selection theory.
'FASCINATING' The Times
‘Matt Ridley is one of our finest science writers … A treat for bird lovers and evolutionary biologists alike’ Richard Dawkins
Animals rarely treat sex as a simple or mutually beneficial transaction. Choosing a mate is often a transcendent event to be approached with reverence, suspicion, angst and quite a bit of violence. For Matt Ridley, nowhere is this more acute than in birds.
From a freezing hide on the Pennine moors at dawn, Ridley closely studies the rare Black Grouse. He is there for the lek – an elaborate courtship ritual of squabbling and strutting males. They dance and sing for hours each day to attract a mate over several months. With most males leaving exhausted and unsuccessful, Ridley looks at how females make their choice to cast fresh light on how such rituals have evolved and why.
His pursuit follows five generations of biologists from Darwin and Wallace to the present day, uncovering how they have grappled with the implications of sexual selection as an eccentric, gonzo form of evolution. While most Victorian scientists found it impossible to believe female birds could select mates, Darwin was obsessed with the idea of sexual as well as natural selection.
Drawing on his own lifelong passion, Ridley eavesdrops on the elaborate displays of bird species around the world, from the complex art installations made by Bowerbirds in Australia to the bubbling calls of Curlews in the UK’s declining moorlands. In a wonderful blend of nature writing and elegant exploration of recent evolutionary theory, Birds, Sex and Beauty shows not only how mate choice has shaped the natural world, including humans, but how the song and plumage of birds can be thrillingly, breathtakingly beautiful.
‘Clear and entertaining … Ridley explains all this history with lucidity and wit’New Statesman
‘Most of this fascinating and accessible book is about birds … Ridley, very clearly, loves birds — and the enthusiasm is infectious’The Times
‘This is a fascinating story told with wit, scholarship and the passion of a true conversationist. Lord Ridley writes in the best tradition of great British naturalists’ Country Life
‘Birds, Sex & Beauty is a good read. It is a compelling history of sexual selection, rather than a synthesis that moves the field forwards’Nature
Critics Review
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‘Matt Ridley is one of our finest science writers. Author of The Red Queen, he here revisits the fascinating and controversial topic of sexual selection, this time in a series of penetrating meditations from his hide, as he watches the courtship rituals of grouse, peacocks, snipe, ruffs and others. The book is a treat for bird lovers and evolutionary biologists alike’ Richard Dawkins, author of The Selfish Gene
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‘Ridley’s book – written with a pleasingly light touch, larded with literary quotations and illustrated with excellent colour photographs – is illuminating, incisive and a pleasure to read’ Literary Review
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‘Matt Ridley is both an inspiring nature writer and a limpid science explainer, and this book is filled with beauty and insight’ Steven Pinker, author of Rationality and Johnstone Professor of Psychology, Harvard University
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‘A tour de force! Simply the best account – among a great many – of Darwin’s ground-breaking and far-reaching concept of sexual selection, from its inception to our current understanding inspired by the tale of a black grouse’ Tim Birkhead, author of The Wisdom of Birds
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‘In his highly readable book Ridley suggests that if we suppose our own evolution conforms to general patterns found throughout nature, perhaps it has been manifestations of wit, intelligence and mind that have appealed, over the eons, to the females of our own lineage’ Jonathan Kingdon, author of Origin Africa
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‘A heady tour through the ideas about sexual selection, but it is more than a summary of the history of thought … This book shows that sexual behaviour continues to be a mystery worthy of investigation’ Mary Colwell, author of Curlew Moon
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‘A captivating journey into the dazzling world of avian courtship, where feathers, dances and songs reveal the secrets of evolution – and offer a mirror to our own desires and dilemmas’ Steve Stewart-Williams, Professor of Psychology, University of Nottingham Malaysia
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Details
- Author
- Matt Ridley
- Narrator
- Matt Ridley
- Duration
- 11 hours 32 minutes
- Release Date
- 13 March 2025
- ISBN
- 9780008645557
- Format
- x-book®
- Publisher
- HarperCollins Publishers
- Genre
- Zoology: birds (ornithology), Ethology and animal behaviour, Evolutionary anthropology / Human evolution, Evolution / Evolutionary biology, Philosophy: aesthetics, Endangered species and extinction of species, Nature and the natural world: general interest
Synopsis
In his new book, acclaimed science writer Matt Ridley looks to the peculiar mating rituals of birds to better understand the rich origins and ongoing significance of Darwin's sexual selection theory. 'FASCINATING' The Times ‘Matt Ridley is one of our finest science writers … A treat for bird lovers and evolutionary biologists alike’ Richard Dawkins Animals rarely treat sex as a simple or mutually beneficial transaction. Choosing a mate is often a transcendent event to be approached with reverence, suspicion, angst and quite a bit of violence. For Matt Ridley, nowhere is this more acute than in birds. From a freezing hide on the Pennine moors at dawn, Ridley closely studies the rare Black Grouse. He is there for the lek – an elaborate courtship ritual of squabbling and strutting males. They dance and sing for hours each day to attract a mate over several months. With most males leaving exhausted and unsuccessful, Ridley looks at how females make their choice to cast fresh light on how such rituals have evolved and why. His pursuit follows five generations of biologists from Darwin and Wallace to the present day, uncovering how they have grappled with the implications of sexual selection as an eccentric, gonzo form of evolution. While most Victorian scientists found it impossible to believe female birds could select mates, Darwin was obsessed with the idea of sexual as well as natural selection. Drawing on his own lifelong passion, Ridley eavesdrops on the elaborate displays of bird species around the world, from the complex art installations made by Bowerbirds in Australia to the bubbling calls of Curlews in the UK’s declining moorlands. In a wonderful blend of nature writing and elegant exploration of recent evolutionary theory, Birds, Sex and Beauty shows not only how mate choice has shaped the natural world, including humans, but how the song and plumage of birds can be thrillingly, breathtakingly beautiful. ‘Clear and entertaining … Ridley explains all this history with lucidity and wit’New Statesman ‘Most of this fascinating and accessible book is about birds … Ridley, very clearly, loves birds — and the enthusiasm is infectious’The Times ‘This is a fascinating story told with wit, scholarship and the passion of a true conversationist. Lord Ridley writes in the best tradition of great British naturalists’ Country Life ‘Birds, Sex & Beauty is a good read. It is a compelling history of sexual selection, rather than a synthesis that moves the field forwards’Nature
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