What is it about Rachel Carson’s
Silent Spring
(1962) that transports so many readers into “life changing” exhortations? Is it the direct yet compassionate radical message of what we as a species have failed to realize in our reckless trajectory toward oblivion? Is it whistle blowing of the highest order? Does it offer solutions along with critical analysis? Whatever the formula for success, her success—despite attempts to ban the book—is not arguable. Were her book to attain a modicum of comparable acceptance in these dystopic times then her mission will have been accomplished. She is not above emulation of the masters, a practice she learned as a composer, not an author. But it is something that suits well whatever creative endeavor we practice. Her response to all queries remains, “read the book.”