- Hardcover: 304 pages
- Publisher: Crown; 1st Edition edition (Aug 10 2004)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 1400048842
- ISBN-13: 978-1400048847
- Product Dimensions: 21 x 15 x 2.8 cm
- Shipping Weight: 522 g
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #1,110,301 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Details |
Product Description
From Publishers Weekly
While working as a copy editor two decades ago, Huler chanced across the Beaufort scale in Merriam-Webster's Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary. He was entranced by the scale's "quintessence of... verbal economy, the ultimate expression of concise, clear, and absolutely powerful writing, 110 words in six-point type" that describe the varieties of wind from "calm" to "hurricane." Huler soon turned to a successful career as a writer and NPR contributor, but the Beaufort scale stuck with him, and he decided to learn more about the man whose definition of a "strong breeze" reads: "large branches in motion; telegraph wires whistle; umbrellas used with difficulty." Huler's admittedly obsessive narrative ranges from the late–18th-century ships of the British West Indies Company to a wind tunnel at the University of Michigan, leading "through sailing and engineering and science and technology." But at its heart is a fascination with the language we use to describe the world around us. Less a piece of science writing than a writer's meditation on science, this gem of a book is equal parts history, mystery, textbook and memoir, as much a story about how we think about the wind as it is about the wind itself, and deserves a wide audience among readers interested in writing, nature and history. 30 illus.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
From Booklist
During the course of copyediting, Huler encountered the Beaufort scale of wind strength in a dictionary and became curious about its eponym. Beaufort headed the British navy's office for charts and surveys from 1829 to 1855. Huler discovered that two biographies of Francis Beaufort already exist (Alfred Friendly's Beaufort of the Admiralty, 1977, and Nicholas Courtney's Gale Force 10, 2002), so he decided to explore the history of the scale itself. Ranging from how the scale rated inclusion in his dictionary to pre-Beaufortian attempts to regularize a wind scale, Huler digresses in directions that connect, in interesting fashion, to the scale. Some are directly pertinent, such as historical progress in understanding weather or biographical facts about Beaufort (who'd guess incest lurks among them?), while others muse upon the scale as an apex of observational, descriptive science. Whether tracing the scale's evolving linguistic content or the route of one of Beaufort's surveys, Huler wonderfully relays the history contained, as he so aptly writes, in the Beaufort scale's "one hundred ten words . . and four centuries of backstory." Gilbert Taylor
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
4.3 out of 5 stars (13 customer reviews)
22 of 22 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
The Wind for Poets, Dec 18 2004
By Bruce Crocker "agnostictrickster" - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Defining the Wind: The Beaufort Scale, and How a 19th-Century Admiral Turned Science into Poetry (Hardcover)
Defining The Wind by Scott Huler is a special book that combines two of my loves in life - earth science and language. Huler, a writer who is NOT a science writer by trade, fell in love with the Beaufort [Wind] Scale in 1983 while a copy editor scanning a copy of the dictionary. He was so impressed with the 110 words of the scale and their simple but poetic qualities, he embarked on an extended intellectual journey to discover the scale's author. Defining The Wind is Huler's wonderful retelling of that journey. Along the way, Huler learns to draw, learns to help sail a tall ship, and rummages through many a dusty archive. Without spoiling anything, I can tell you that Huler discovers that Francis Beaufort did not write the version of the scale that Huler fell in love with. I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in meteorology, surveying, the ocean, sailing tall ships, history, or the use of language in science. Random thought: I wonder if this would be a good book to give to a teenage writer or artist who doesn't see the benefit of taking science and math classes in high school?
18 of 21 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Where science and art meet, Aug 24 2004
By Kathleen F. Anderson "One who loves to read" - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Defining the Wind: The Beaufort Scale, and How a 19th-Century Admiral Turned Science into Poetry (Hardcover)
This is a thoroughly engaging true-life detective story. The author, Scott Huler, was struck by the poetic beauty of the Beaufort Scale, a way to determine the force and velocity of the wind by how it moves objects, i.e. "small trees in leaf begin to sway - MPH 19-24 - Name, fresh breeze - Beaufort # 5. He set out to discover the art of Sir Francis Beaufort. Through his search he shines a light on the what the essence of poetry is and the fact that nothing is born of itself.
11 of 12 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars
A great read, Oct 26 2004
By A Reader - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Defining the Wind: The Beaufort Scale, and How a 19th-Century Admiral Turned Science into Poetry (Hardcover)
I greatly enjoyed this book. It is a vivid introduction into the life of times of Admiral Beaufort, and the history of defining the wind. This book was well worth the money and the time to read it. It awakens in the reader the spirit of discovery and exploration that imbued Beauforts age. Mr. Huler gets a bit sentimental about his subject which detracts a bit from the story (hence 4 not 5 starts). Bottom line: you'll enjoy it.
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