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Books

All in the name of science: three young naturalists go on an Amazonian killing-spree

A review of Naturalists in Paradise by John Hemming describes how the naturalist Russell Wallace helped solve the problem of the origin of the species

21 March 2015

9:00 AM

21 March 2015

9:00 AM

Naturalists in Paradise: Wallace, Bates and Spruce in the Amazon John Hemming

Thames & Hudson, pp.368, £19.95

John Hemming is our greatest living scholar-explorer. He is best known for his extraordinary first book The Conquest of the Incas, published in 1970 when he was 35 — a work of vivid, monumental scholarship that is still unsurpassed. His love for the peoples of the Amazon produced a remarkable historical trilogy: Red Gold (1978), Amazon Frontier (1987) and Die If You Must (2004), which together cover the years from 1560 to the end of the 20th century.

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Available from the Spectator Bookshop, £15.95 Tel: 08430 600033. Redmond O’Hanlon’s books include Congo Journey, In Trouble Again and Into the Heart of Borneo.

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