Tudge, Colin 1943-

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Tudge, Colin 1943-

PERSONAL:

Born April 22, 1943, in London, England; son of Cyril (a musician) and Maisie (a homemaker) Tudge; married September 9, 1966 (divorced); married Ruth West, September 28, 2001; children: two daughters, one son. Education: Peterhouse, Cambridge, B.A., 1965, M.A., 1966.

ADDRESSES:

Home—Oxford, England Agent—Felicity Bryan, 2A N. Parade, Banbury Rd., Oxford OX2 6LX, England. E-mail—[email protected].

CAREER:

Magazine journalist, 1965-80; New Scientist, features editor, 1980-84; BBC-Radio, presenter for Science Unit, 1985-90, including the series Science on Three and Spectrum; freelance writer, 1990—. University of London, Visiting Research Fellow, Centre for Philosophy, London School of Economics and Political Science. Lecture tour for the British Council to New Zealand, China, Malta, and Spain, 2000, 2001. London Zoo Reform Group, co-founder, 1991, member of council, 1992-94.

MEMBER:

Linnean Society (fellow).

AWARDS, HONORS:

Named Glaxo/ABSW Science Writer of the Year, 1972, 1984, 1990; shortlisted for COPUS/Rhone-Poulenc Science Book of the Year Award, 1992, for Last Animals at the Zoo, and 1994, for Engineer in the Garden; BP Conservation Book of the Year Award, 1996, for The Day before Yesterday.

WRITINGS:

The Famine Business, St. Martin's (New York, NY), 1977.

(With Michael Allaby) Home Farm: Complete Food Self-Sufficiency, Macmillan (London, England), 1977.

Future Food: Politics, Philosophy and Recipes for the Twenty-first Century, Harmony Books (New York, NY), 1980, published as Future Cook, Mitchell Beazley (London, England), 1980.

Food Crops for the Future: The Development of Plant Resources, Basil Blackwell (Oxford, England), 1988.

(Editor) The Environment of Life, Oxford University Press (New York, NY), 1988.

Global Ecology, Oxford University Press (New York, NY), 1991.

Last Animals at the Zoo: How Mass Extinction Can Be Stopped, Hutchinson Radius (London, England), 1991, Island Press (Washington, DC), 1992.

The Engineer in the Garden: Genes and Genetics: From the Idea of Heredity to the Creation of Life, J. Cape (London, England), 1993, Hill & Wang (New York, NY), 1995.

The Time before History: Five Million Years of Human Impact, Scribner (New York, NY), 1996, published as The Day before Yesterday: Five Million Years of Human History, 1996.

Neanderthals, Bandits, and Farmers: How Agriculture Really Began, Yale University Press (New Haven, CT), 1999.

In Mendel's Footnotes: An Introduction to the Science and Technologies of Genes and Genetics from the Nineteenth Century to the Twenty-Second, J. Cape (London, England), 2000, published as The Impact of the Gene: From Mendel's Peas to Designer Babies, Hill & Wang (New York, NY), 2001.

The Variety of Life: The Meaning of Biodiversity, Oxford University Press (New York, NY), 2000.

(With Ian Wilmut and Keith Campbell) The Second Creation: Dolly and the Age of Biological Control, Headline (London, England), 2000.

Food for the Future, DK Publishers (New York, NY), 2002.

The Secret Life of Trees, Allen Lane (New York, NY), 2005, published as The Tree: A Natural History of What Trees Are, How They Live, and Why They Matter, Crown Publishers (New York, NY), 2006.

Feeding People Is Easy, Pari Publishing (Pari, Italy) 2007.

Food columnist, Kew, 1990-92. Contributor to the New Statesman.

SIDELIGHTS:

Colin Tudge is a British science writer who translates the difficult concepts of conservation, agriculture, evolution and genetics into books that can be understood by general readers. His conversational tone, honed through work as a journalist for the British Broadcasting Corporation, helps to de-mystify difficult scientific concepts such as cloning and cladistics. In Booklist, Donna Seaman suggested that Tudge overviews "human history in its entirety and in terms of its … connections to the earth and our fellow species." Indeed, the author's books range from treatments of production of plant foods and the history of farming to cautionary tales of the unforeseen consequences of mass extinctions.

In a BioScience review of Food Crops for the Future: The Development of Plant Resources, Peter Day commended Tudge for "picking out the important elements in scientific reports and presenting them clearly to a wide audience." The book provides an overview of food plants and cultivation, identifies some crops that might prove particularly useful as food sources in the future, and explains the basic science of plant breeding. The result, according to Day, is an important book that "deserves the wide audience for which it was prepared." Lee Swanson, in an Alternatives review of Last Animals at the Zoo: How Mass Extinction Can Be Stopped, wrote that Tudge "provides an excellent synopsis, supported by vital information on the importance of zoos…. The book is a definite must for individuals who are not familiar with the threat of extinction facing wildlife." In The Time before History: Five Million Years of Human Impact and Neanderthals, Bandits, and Farmers: How Agriculture Really Began, Tudge presents information on the impact of humans and prehuman hominids on the global ecology. New Statesman & Society correspondent Patrick Curry found the latter work "well written and authoritative without being dogmatic." According to Corey S. Powell, writing in Discover, Neanderthals, Bandits, and Farmers "blows apart the standard theory that our ancestors were disorganized hunter-gatherers until 10,100 years ago, when agriculture began. More likely, humans were practicing proto-farming as early as 40,000 years ago." This idyllic situation changed when the last Ice Age ended 10,000 years ago and melting ice caps flooded areas where humans had easily obtained food. As a result, a vicious cycle ensued: people worked harder to grow food, but greater crop yields supported a larger population that required more food and therefore more labor.

The science of genetics is particularly fascinating to Tudge. He has written books on specific topics, such as cloning—The Second Creation: Dolly and the Age ofBiological Control—and classification of species—The Variety of Life: The Meaning of Biodiversity. He also offers a history of genetics in The Impact of the Gene, from Mendel's Peas to Designer Babies. The Second Creation, which was written with the two scientists who cloned the ewe named Dolly, was praised by Sarah Richardson in Discover as "an exhaustingly detailed yet coherent chronicle of the century-long project to divine the basic machinery of life." In Lancet, Steven Rose declared The Second Creation "a quite superb piece of science teaching" and "an exciting story, well told." Booklist contributor Bryce Christensen noted that in The Variety of Life Tudge "turns all of biology into an intellectual adventure." As a Publishers Weekly reviewer observed in a piece on The Impact of the Gene, Tudge, "has great facility as a popularizer…. [He] will draw in and satisfy the curious neophyte."

The Tree: A Natural History of What Trees Are, How They Live, and Why They Matter earned significant praise. The book provides a wealth of information about tree biology, and argues for the central importance of trees in world ecology. In a starred review in Booklist, Donna Seaman described The Tree as a "sumptuously specific tour of the phenomenal world of trees," which, according to Tudge, are miracles of engineering that have found perfect solutions to the challenges of how to thrive in their particular environments. The book catalogs some 60,000 species of trees, describing how they have adapted physically to their particular environments and what economic and ecological roles they have played in history. Trees, Tudge writes, helped form the earth's atmosphere through photosynthesis, thereby making it possible for terrestrial animals to develop. Trees also provide shelter and food, protect against soil erosion, and mitigate the effects of pollution. Yet, as Tudge emphasizes in his final section, rapid global warming presents a huge threat to trees. To safeguard the future of the earth, he concludes, we must reject continued carbon-based industrial development in favor of smaller economies that consider "the realities of soil, water and climate."

Reviewing The Tree (published in Britain as The Secret Life of Trees) in the London Guardian, Adam Thorpe noted that "on page after page we are confronted by yet another ‘truly extraordinary’ creation, the result of ‘convergent evolution’—or the innate desire in Nature to cooperate." Admiring the "dozens of ‘wow’ and ‘who knew?’ moments throughout" the book, New York Times Book Review contributor Elizabeth Royte also appreciated Tudge's courage in calling for radical political change to protect the planet's biology. Several critics expressed similar praise. A reviewer for Publishers Weekly called the book an "elegant tribute to denizens of nature that humans too often take for granted," and found Tudge's call to action persuasive. "Few books," observed a writer for Kirkus Reviews, "are as relevant for our time as is this one."

In Feeding People Is Easy, Tudge argues that it is possible to feed the earth's population without environmental degradation or cruelty to animals. Tudge advocates a mostly plant-based diet, explaining that eating in this way is best for economic, ecological, and health reasons. London Guardian contributor Steven Poole found the book a "charming polemic" against the forces of agribusiness. In the Financial Times, Neville Hawcock hailed the book as a "compelling" work.

Tudge once told CA: "I write largely because I enjoy the process of writing. I like to take a word processor on holiday, and I miss it if it is not there. Then I write a great deal that I never seriously expect to get published. I would like the world to be a better place, and I like to think that, by writing, I can change things. If I had not been a writer, I would have become a schoolteacher (and at times have regretted not doing so).

"Overall I suppose that writing is actually a very self-indulgent (perhaps ultimately self-indulgent) way to make a living. This does not mean it is not hard or serious. Writing provides a way of becoming involved in ideas and causes, without being exposed to reality; for example, the tedium of most laboratory science, the politics of professional academe, or the very considerable burdens of modern schoolteaching.

"I am influenced by people I think do things better than I do (or perhaps possibly could). I am aware of the influence of Anthony Burgess, who writes extraordinarily well; of Charles Darwin, who had such a marvelous way of life (and managed to change the world more profoundly than anyone); of people like my friend and fellow scribbler Bernard Dixon, who gets such a lot done; or Helena Cronin, co-director of the Centre for Philosophy at the London School of Economics and author of The Ant and the Peacock, who is so scholarly; and John Steinbeck, whom I have not read for many years, but who introduced me to Mack and the boys (in Cannery Row and Sweet Thursday) and implanted in my mind the notion that nine-to-five timetables were equivalent to death.

"Now that I have a word processor, I write paragraphs and passages as they come to me, until the whole thing becomes too messy and I start all over again. Diversion is vital. Good ideas and structures sort themselves out in your head, provided you plant the problems carefully and do not worry at them too much while the brain is working them out.

"Biology has always been my first love; the whole business of writing runs it a close second. I remember writing a long story about cats at the age of six, and essentially nothing much has changed since then. On the one hand, I have a penchant for practicalities (such as farming and conservation) and, on the other, a penchant for philosophy, particularly moral philosophy and the philosophy of science."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Agricultural History, January 1, 1989, Thomas R. Dunlap, review of Food Crops for the Future: The Development of Plant Resources, p. 114.

Alternatives, May-June, 1993, Lee Swanson, review of Last Animals at the Zoo: How Mass Extinction Can Be Stopped, p. 42.

BioScience, January, 1989, Peter Day, review of Food Crops for the Future, p. 45.

Booklist, March 15, 1995, William Beatty, review of The Engineer in the Garden: Genes and Genetics: From the Idea of Heredity to the Creation of Life, p. 1294; December 1, 1995, Donna Seaman, review of The Time before History: Five Million Years of Human Impact, p. 601; September 1, 1999, Mary Carroll, review of Neanderthals, Bandits, and Farmers: How Agriculture Really Began, p. 40; May 15, 2000, Bryce Christensen, review of The Variety of Life: The Meaning of Biodiversity, p. 1713; September 1, 2006, Donna Seaman, review of The Tree: A Natural History of What Trees Are, How They Live, and Why They Matter, p. 31.

Cuisine, September 1, 1981, Jan Weimer, review of Future Foods, p. 18.

Discover, October, 1999, Corey S. Powell, review of Neanderthals, Bandits, and Farmers, p. 108; July, 2000, Sarah Richardson, review of The Second Creation: Dolly and the Age of Biological Control, p. 116.

Ecologist, October 1, 2003, Douglas Bebb, review of So Shall We Reap, p. 61.

Economist, November 9, 1991, review of Last Animals at the Zoo, p. 104.

Entertainment Weekly, October 6, 2006, Joan Keener, review of The Tree, p. 77.

Financial Times, April 13, 2007, Neville Hawcock, review of Feeding People Is Easy.

Geographical Journal, March 1, 1989, review of Food Crops for the Future, p. 127.

Guardian (London, England), November 26, 2005, Adam Thorpe, "Listen to the Trees;" April 14, 2007, Steven Poole, review of Feeding People Is Easy.

Kirkus Reviews, August 1, 2006, review of The Tree, p. 775.

Lancet, February 19, 2000, Steven Rose, "Are We Like Sheep …?," p. 661.

Library Journal, March 1, 1988, Ellis Mount, review of The Environment of Life, p. 29; June 1, 2001, Marianne Stowell Bracke, review of The Impact of the Gene: from Mendel's Peas to Designer Babies, p. 206; September 1, 2006, Robert Eagan, review of The Tree, p. 174.

London Review of Books, December 1, 2005, Peter Campbell, Get Planting, p. 32.

Maclean's, December 12, 1988, review of The Environment of Life, p. 62.

Nature, February 22, 1996, Bernard Wood, review of The Day Before Yesterday: Five Million Years of Human History, p. 687; December 5, 1996, review of The Day Before Yesterday, p. 426; March 11, 2004, Anthony Trewavas, "So Shall We Reap," p. 124.

New Scientist, November 23, 1996, review of The Day Before Yesterday, p. 47; March 23, 2002, Barbara Kiser, "Tuck In," p. 51; April 23, 2002, review of Food for the Future, p. 51.

New Statesman & Society, February 2, 1996, Patrick Curry, review of The Day Before Yesterday, p. 36.

New York Review of Books, February 15, 2007, Tim Flannery, "What Is a Tree?," p. 34.

New York Times Book Review, June 18, 2000, W. Ford Doolittle, "Another Branch of the Family," p. 20; October 15, 2006, Elizabeth Royte, review of The Tree.

Publishers Weekly, July 18, 1980, review of Future Food, p. 57; January 23, 1995, review of The Engineer in the Garden, p. 53; December 4, 1995, review of The Time Before History, p. 46; August 30, 1999, review of Neanderthals, Bandits, and Farmers, p. 70; June 4, 2001, review of The Impact of the Gene, p. 69; July 10, 2006, review of The Tree, p. 62.

Quarterly Review of Biology, March 1, 1989, Garrison Wilkes, review of Food Crops for the Future, p. 73.

Science Books & Films, January 1, 1989, review of The Environment of Life, p. 157.

Scientific American, February 1, 1990, review of Food Crops for the Future, p. 106.

SciTech Book News, March 1, 1988, review of The Environment of Life, p. 3.

Spectator, January 28, 2006, Oliver Rackham, "All Roots and Branches," p. 46.

Times Higher Education Supplement, April 16, 2004, Jules Pretty, "Hunger and Illness in a Fertile Field," p. 30; April 21, 2006, Timothy Walker, "Wood Is Good for the World," p. 28.

Times Literary Supplement, December 12, 2003, John Postgate, "A Spectre Haunting the Globe," p. 24.

Whole Earth Review, fall, 1989, Kevin Kelly, review of Food Crops for the Future.