One of humanity's oldest beliefs is that our world is alive. Though once ridiculed by some scientists, the idea of Earth as a vast interconnected living system has gained acceptance in recent decades. We, and all living things, are more than inhabitants of Earth—we are Earth, an outgrowth of its structure and an engine of its evolution. Life and its environment have coevolved for billions of years, transforming a lump of orbiting rock into a cosmic oasis—a planet that breathes, metabolizes, and regulates its climate.
Becoming Earth is at its core an ode to life’s ability to adapt, transform, and create the conditions for its own flourishing. Elegantly told in three sections ... Jabr’s deft descriptive voice expands the possibilities of the genre ... Such poetic precision is not just in the service of making specialized knowledge broadly understandable; it also evokes the creative exuberance of life remaking the world in service of making more life ... Where Becoming Earth touches on politics, Jabr’s prose is somewhat undermined by the pronoun we ... An excellent articulation of the need to slow plastic production ... Becoming Earth is quietly radical in its suggestion that any history, indeed any story, that includes people must also include the Earth in all its vitality.
The best books manage to entertain, educate, astonish and even galvanise the reader, bringing an appreciation of new realms of knowledge. They expand awareness, not just of the beauty and complexity of the universe, but our place in it as human beings. They serve as celebrations and warnings, challenges and pleas. Traditionally, the genre tends to garland hard data with lashings of anecdote and well-turned, elegant metaphor. With Becoming Earth, Oregon-based journalist Ferris Jabr achieves all of these aims and more.
