1947
In January is appointed Professor of Anthropology at the University of Pennsylvania and assumes chairmanship of his department; with Mabel, rents a small apartment in suburban Rose Valley, outside Philadelphia. Works with Froelich Rainey, newly appointed director of the University Museum, to restore long-strained ties between the Museum and the Department of Anthropology; is named curator of early man at the Museum. Postpones South African trip after he learns that a group from the University of California will soon be en route with similar objectives; hopes to revise his itinerary and sail in a year.
1948
Travels to Oaxaca, Mexico, in the fall after human skeletal remains are unearthed near those of an ancient elephant, a potentially significant discovery that ultimately proves less important than it appears. Abandons South African travel plans, citing “the unsettled state of both departmental and family affairs.” Suffers from partial deafness after an ear infection in the fall, recovering about six months later. Comes to an informal agreement with Harper & Brothers to publish a collection of essays; works with editor Jack Fischer. Presents paper on “Providence and the Death of Species” at meeting of the American Anthropological Association in December, in Toronto.
1949
Teaches at Berkeley over the summer, afterward traveling to Wyoming, near Cody, where he investigates a distinctive arrowhead site. Moves with Mabel to a new apartment in Wynnewood, a prosperous suburb on the Philadelphia Main Line. In September is elected president of the newly formed American Institute of Human Paleontology, after a meeting of leading physical anthropologists in New York, which he attends. Publishes “The Fire Apes” in Harper’s; tells Ray Bradbury, who writes him in praise of the essay, that he is “contemplating doing a book.”
1950
Delivers a eulogy for Frank Speck after his death on February 7.
1951
Toward the end of the year, travels briefly to England to arrange for the university museum’s acquisition of an important collection of plaster casts of paleontological specimens.
1952
Accepts a commission from the American Philosophical Society to write a book on the reception of Darwin’s ideas in America, to be published on the centennial of the first edition of On the Origin of Species, in 1959. Helps the Society build its Darwin collections, locating books and manuscripts for acquisition. (Wright Morris occasionally accompanies him on buying trips.) Wife Mabel takes part-time job as secretary to the director of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, in subsequent years becoming an associate director of that institution. Begins a year’s leave with fellowship support to work on a book about “the philosophical implications of human evolution.”
1953
In July, meets with Jack Fischer to discuss essay collection.
1954
Essay “Man the Firemaker” appears in Scientific American in September.
1955
After discussions at the American Philosophical Society, abandons plans for a book on Darwinism in America, and agrees in December to edit two volumes of the letters of Darwin and his contemporaries. (Subsequently renegotiates this commitment, and instead of the proposed volumes works intensely on a book about the history of evolution tentatively titled “The Time Voyagers,” solicited by Doubleday editor Jason Epstein.)
1956
Early in the year, meets with Hiram Haydn, editor-in-chief at Random House, who persuades him to work with the firm on a book gathering his essays; proposes to call it “The Great Deeps.” Begins a year’s sabbatical in September, freeing him to advance his American Philosophical Society publication projects. Presents Haydn with a manuscript of his essay collection, now titled “The Crack in the Absolute,” on November 13; they ultimately agree on the title The Immense Journey. Readers for the press recommend substantial revisions to Eiseley’s initial submission.
1957
In January, meets with Haydn in Philadelphia to discuss alterations to The Immense Journey; rewrites and reorganizes it, dropping several essays. Submits a manuscript of “The Time Voyagers” to Doubleday in June. The Immense Journey is published on August 26; travels to New York for radio interviews about the book. Joins editorial board of The American Scholar.
1958
Proposes to edit an anthology of naturalists’ writings for Random House; at a meeting in New York in February, Haydn convinces him instead to sign a contract for a second book of his own essays. “The Time Voyagers,” now titled Darwin’s Century: Evolution and the Men Who Discovered It, is published by Doubleday in July.
1959
Darwin’s Century wins Phi Beta Kappa science prize. Is appointed provost of the University of Pennsylvania in October; quickly realizes he has overcommitted himself. Mother dies on November 29. Delivers six public lectures at the College of Medicine of the University of Cincinnati.
1960
Publishes The Firmament of Time, gathering his University of Cincinnati lectures.
1961
In March, delivers the Montgomery Lectures on Contemporary Civilization at the University of Nebraska, addressing the life and significance of Francis Bacon on the four hundredth anniversary of his birth. On April 3, is awarded the John Burroughs Medal for The Firmament of Time. Resigns as provost in April, and in the fall becomes a fellow of the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences, in Palo Alto.
1962
Aunt Grace dies on January 17. In February, gives the fifth annual lecture of the John Dewey Society, in Chicago; it is published eight months later by Harper & Row, titled The Mind as Nature. Visits New York in June, meeting with editors and publishers. Returning to Penn in July, is named University Professor in the Life Sciences.
1963
Francis Bacon and the Modern Dilemma, an expanded version of his 1961 Nebraska lectures, is published on January 15. Delivers address “The Divine Animal” on May 22, at a New York meeting of the National Institute of Arts and Letters. Accepts a position as director of the new Richard Prentice Ettinger Program for Creative Writing at Rockefeller University; on June 27, at ceremonies inaugurating the program, gives address “The Illusion of Two Cultures.”
1964
Is awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in April, enabling a year’s leave of absence from Penn. Hires Caroline E. Werkley as his administrative assistant, to oversee the affairs of the Ettinger Program; she remains his assistant for the rest of his life. In November is relieved of his duties as Ettinger director, charged with neglecting them. Named to President’s Task Force on the Preservation of Natural Beauty, travels to Washington, D.C., for a press conference, and meets with Lyndon Johnson.
1965
Addresses the Nebraska Academy of Sciences in April, on “The Inner Galaxy: A Prelude to Space.”
1966
Gives address “Man, Time, and Prophecy” at the University of Kansas Centennial Celebration in April. Serves as host and narrator of Animal Secrets, an NBC television series that airs for about eighteen months.
1967
Vacations on Sanibel Island in Florida in February. Spends the fall semester at the University of Wisconsin, where he has been appointed Johnson Research Professor. Tours the countryside around Madison with Walter Hamady, an assistant professor of art and the proprietor of The Perishable Press, who proposes to publish some of Eiseley’s works in an illustrated limited edition.
1968
In Dallas at a December meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, gives an interview to the Dallas Morning News in which he questions the value of the space program, given its immense cost; many criticize his remarks.
1969
Spends three winter weeks in Aruba with Mabel; later in the year, she retires from her position at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. Delivers a series of lectures at the University of Washington in Seattle in the fall. The Unexpected Universe is published in October to widely positive reviews. Receives copies of The Brown Wasps, a collection of three essays pu
blished in a limited edition by Walter Hamady at The Perishable Press; “the books are beautiful,” he writes Hamady. Begins a novel, never completed, titled “The Snow Wolf.”
1970
On February 21, The New Yorker publishes a warmly favorable review by W. H. Auden of The Unexpected Universe; Eiseley and Auden subsequently correspond, and meet for lunch. The Unexpected Universe is nominated for a National Book Award. Invitation to deliver the commencement address at Kent State is cancelled by the university after the shooting of four students on May 4. Receives honorary doctor of science degree from St. Lawrence University in New York, one of many such honors. The Invisible Pyramid is published in October.
1971
Elected to the National Institute of Arts and Letters. The Night Country is published November 10.
1972
Suffers from viral pneumonia during the fall. In November publishes Notes of an Alchemist, a book of poems, with Scribner’s; receives a note of praise from Auden, who asks permission to dedicate a poem to Eiseley.
1973
The Man Who Saw Through Time, a revised and expanded edition of Francis Bacon and the Modern Dilemma, is published by Scribner’s in April. Over the summer spends ten days with Froelich Rainey of the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology at Penn, doing archaeological fieldwork in Dawson County, Montana. Visits Walden Pond and Thoreau’s grave in Masssachusetts; considers writing a book about Thoreau and discusses the project with Scribner’s. The Innocent Assassins, a second collection of poetry, appears in October.
1974
On September 18, at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., is presented with the Distinguished Nebraskan Award. Toward the end of the year, begins working intensively on a long-postponed volume of autobiography; it is initially titled “The Other Player.”
1975
Publishes his autobiography, All the Strange Hours: The Excavation of a Life, in October.
1976
Sits for a portrait bust by sculptor Kappy Wells. Learns after routine prostate surgery in September that doctors have discovered a malignant bile duct tumor.
1977
Undergoes a pancreatectomy on January 27, returning home at the end of March. Receives galleys for Another Kind of Autumn, a book of poems to be published by Scribner’s. Dictates a letter to Scribner’s proposing an outline of the contents of his last book, published posthumously by Times Books as The Star Thrower. Returns to the hospital in June, his tumor having returned. Dies on July 9.
Note on the Text
This e-Book, drawn from the second of a two-volume set, Collected Essays on Evolution, Nature, and the Cosmos, by Loren Eiseley—presents the complete text of The Invisible Pyramid (1970). The first volume in the set presents The Immense Journey (1957), The Firmament of Time (1960), The Unexpected Universe (1969), and a selection of uncollected prose writings. The text of The Invisible Pyramid has been taken from a corrected later printing of the first edition, as described below.
The Invisible Pyramid. In January 1969, shortly after the names of the first lunar astronauts were announced, Eiseley signed an agreement with Charles Scribner’s Sons to produce a book of essays that would “put the moon shot in perspective with other explorations.” The characterization was that of his new editor, Kenneth Heuer, who had begun a correspondence with Eiseley some fifteen years before; the two met regularly in New York and spoke frequently on the telephone while Eiseley was writing the book, which he delivered early in 1970. Further information on the composition and publication history of individual essays in The Invisible Pyramid is provided in the list below:
“The Star Dragon.” Incorporates material presented as an address at the Mayo Clinic and published as “Freedom of the Juggernaut,” Mayo Clinic Proceedings, January 1965. An early draft is titled “The Great Chameleon.” First published in Natural History, June–July 1970.
“The Cosmic Prison.” Incorporates material presented at an October 16, 1965, symposium sponsored by the Division of Earth Sciences, National Academy of Sciences, National Research Council, and published as “Man and Novelty” in Time and Stratigraphy in the Evolution of Man (1967).
“The World Eaters.” Incorporates material presented as a lecture at Occidental College in March 1970. First published in The Invisible Pyramid.
“The Spore Bearers.” Drafts incorporate material from a manuscript titled “Space: The First Decade,” subsequently published as “The Invisible Pyramid” in Science Year: The World Book Science Annual, 1967 (1967). First published in its entirety in The Invisible Pyramid.
“The Time Effacers.” First published in The Invisible Pyramid.
“Man in the Autumn Light.” Draft titles included “The Autumn Light,” “The Vast Chameleon,” and “Part of Autumn Light.” Presented as the 1970 Phi Beta Kappa oration at Harvard under the title “Man in the Dark Wood.” Published for the first time in The Invisible Pyramid.
“The Last Magician.” Presented under the title “Man: The Last Magician” as the Danz Lecture at the University of Washington, and later at Purdue University, in November 1969. First published in Playboy, August 1970.
Always a careful reader of proofs, Eiseley found an “almost incredible” number of typographical errors in The Invisible Pyramid as it made its way through the press. “I am the victim of type set by a computer,” he explained to his friend Hal Borland: Scribner’s had just introduced “some kind of new IBM process” in its typesetting, and his book became “the guinea pig.” Having attempted to fix some 350 errors in his initial author’s proofs, he found that his corrections had in many cases precipitated new errors. Later, errors that seemed to have been corrected successfully inexplicably reappeared. Though he made an “enormous effort” to overcome these problems, he quickly found misprints in the book’s October 1, 1970, first printing, and began to keep a list of errors to be corrected.
Eiseley’s subsequent correspondence with Heuer suggests that Scribner’s made two substantial sets of corrections and revisions in later printings of The Invisible Pyramid: he refers to an “‘A’ edition,” a “‘B’ edition,” and a “paper edition” of the book, the hardcover “‘B’ edition” (a printing prior to July 1971) correcting approximately twenty typographical errors and the “paper edition,” in 1972, correcting additional errors and in some instances giving Eiseley the chance to correct his own errors of fact and to revise his prose. (An English edition, published by Rupert Hart-Davis in London in 1971, predates the corrections and revisions Eiseley made for the “paper edition” and appears to have been prepared without his involvement.) The text of The Invisible Pyramid in the present volume is the corrected one of 1972, taken from a Charles Scribner’s Sons paperback printing.
This volume presents the texts of the essays and other writings chosen for inclusion here, but it does not attempt to reproduce features of their typographic design, such as the display capitalization of chapter openings. The texts are reprinted without change, except for the correction of typographical errors. Spelling, punctuation, and capitalization are often expressive features, and they are not altered, even when inconsistent or irregular. The following is a list of typographical errors corrected, cited by page and line number: 8.28, sun ward; 37.4, BAITAILLON; 42.24, the the tracks; 48.6, experiment; 52.2, minature,; 57.7–8, candelight; 62.29, suported; 63.1, that; 76.9, to to; 113.31–32, University of of.
Notes
In the notes below, the reference numbers denote page and line of the print edition (the line count includes chapter headings but not blank lines). No note is generally made for material included in standard desk-reference works. Quotations from Shakespeare are keyed to The Riverside Shakespeare, ed. G. Blakemore Evans (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1974), and biblical references to the King James Version. For further information about Eiseley’s life and works, and references to other studies, see: Gale E. Christianson, Fox at the Wood’s Edge: A Biography of Loren Eiseley (New York: Henry Holt, 1990); Peter Heidtmann, Loren Eiseley: A Modern Ish
mael (Hamden, CT: Archon Books, 1991); Tom Lynch and Susan N. Maher, eds., Artifacts and Illuminations: Critical Essays on Loren Eiseley (Lincoln: University of Nebraska, 2012); and Mary Ellen Pitts, Toward a Dialogue of Understandings: Loren Eiseley and the Critique of Science (Bethlehem, PA: Lehigh University Press, 1995).
2.2 Frank G. Speck] Speck (1881–1950) was chairman of the anthropology department at the University of Pennsylvania when Eiseley began his graduate studies there in 1933, and later supervised Eiseley’s doctoral dissertation.
4.1–5 Once in a cycle . . . NEIHARDT] See “The Poet’s Town” (1910) by Nebraska poet and ethnographer John G. Neihardt (1881–1973).
5.34–35 A. E. Housman . . . home and afar.] See A Shropshire Lad (1896), poem 40, by A. E. Housman (1859–1936).
6.9 Palomar Mountain] Site in San Diego County, California, of Palomar Observatory, which until 1992 possessed the world’s largest telescope.
7.3–5 Already at the origin . . . ROSTAND] See Rostand’s The Substance of Man (1962).
10.20–23 Pindar . . . to the end?”] See Pindar’s sixth Nemean Ode (c. 465 B.C.E).
11.19 Frémont’s] John C. Frémont (1813–1890) conducted five western exploring expeditions between 1842 and 1854.
11.21–22 James Hutton] See Hutton’s Theory of the Earth; or an Investigation of the Laws Observable in the Composition, Dissolution, and Restoration of Land upon the Globe (1788): “The result, therefore, of our present enquiry is, that we find no vestige of a beginning,—no prospect of an end.”
11.38–12.6 Alexis de Tocqueville . . . touching the earth.”] See Tocqueville’s account of his travels in Michigan in 1831, published posthumously as Quinze Jours au Désert (1860) and subsequently translated as A Fortnight in the Wilderness.
17.9 A. L. Kroeber . . . superorganic] See Kroeber’s essay “The Superorganic,” first published in the April–June 1917 issue of American Anthropologist.
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