HarperCollins Adult
My First New YorkLetters to Jackie
Browse Titles

The Whale

In Search of the Giants of the Sea

Philip Hoare

Print PDF
Print PDF
 Export Backlist to Excel
The Whale
 

Marketing Campaign

. National Radio Campaign, Including NPR
. National Print Campaign-Review & Feature Attention
. New England Regional Author Tour, Including Connecticut, Portland (ME); Provincetown, New Bedford and Boston (MA); Portsmouth, (NH); New York City; Providence (RI); and Upon Request
. Online Reviews & Features
. Academic Marketing
. Online and E-card Outreach to Greenpeace, Save the Whales, Aquariums, Whale Enthusiast Sites

Philip Hoare

Philip Hoare is the author of five works of nonfiction, including boks about Noël Coward and Oscar Wilde. He has written and hosted films for the BBC, cocurated the Icons of Pop exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery, and written for Granta. He lives in Southampton, England.



 

Backlist

Also Available

Extras


Quotes

"[Hoare's] work is rigorous, something every serious student of whales--and, more widely conceived, of the natural world--will want to have at hand."


- Washington Post
"Hoare is a splendid writer and a beguiling guide. I found the spell (he) casts powerful and difficult to shake."


- Cleveland Plain Dealer
"You don't have to love Moby Dick to love this book. But if you do, THE WHALE is probably one of the most sublime reading experiences you'll have this year."


- NPR's All Things Considered
"A love letter to the 'largest, loudest, oldest' mammal ever to have existed, Brit biographer Hoare's book romps through science, history and literature to chronicle his obsession with the mighty whale. Salted with astounding facts (the calls of blue whales were one mistaken for earthquakes), this is an exhilarating valentine."


- People
"Philip Hoare's THE WHALE is everything you want from a book. It is unpredictable and amusing and informative and original, cavorting between biology, history, travel writing, and memoir with an engaging sense of the subject's charisma. And the book is even handsome."


- Mark Kurlansky, author of SALT and COD
"This singular, magnificent book inspires both awe and shame-awe of the whales, shame of the human species that has tried to destroy them. In the end, Hoare's virtuosic sympathy for his subject makes you believe in the better angels of our nature."


- Alex Ross, bestselling author of THE REST IS NOISE
"THE WHALE is a moving and extraordinary book. Whales are the largest animal species that ever existed on the planet, and arguably also the most complex and more evolved even than we are. It is hard to swallow how we, a supposedly sentient species, have focused our ingenuity, energies, and industrial might to kill such superlative life and drive it to near extinction. Philip Hoare here brings them, their story, and our long relationship to whales, to life."


- Bernd Heinrich, bestselling author of SUMMER WORLD
"A wonderful read! And a wonder-full adventure that spans the centuries. Hoare magnificently weaves together his own experiences with stories about literary giants whose writings were inspired by whales-Melville, Hawthone, and Thoreau-and he captures the utter beauty, size, and power of the whale."


- Lynne Cox, author of GRAYSON
"Philip Hoare's writing is quite untrammelled by convention and opens up astonishing views at every turn."


- W. G. Sebald
Praise for the British Edition:
 
“A maginificent monster of a book, combining a huge wealth of whale lore, zoology, literature, history, and personal account. Written with great elegance, enthusiasm, and insight it takes us on an enthralling voyage into the underwater world of the whale and the to the heart of an obsession.”
 


- The Guardian
"This is a deep book about the deep; an inspiring book about inspiring beings. . . . If you can't board a ship this week, read this book instead."


- The Times (London)
"Scintillating. . . . Throughout the book, Hoare's unbridled enthusiasm for his subject is infectious. . . . This thoroughly engaging, rigorously researched and often revelatory book is a joy to read and one which Melville, surely, would have appreciated."


- The Independent on Sunday
"So compelling and all-encompassing that it cast a spell on me that endured for days. . . . This is the book Hoare was born to write, a classic of its kind."


- The Observer
"Anyone who loves the sea will love this book.. . . . A Sebald-esque triumph . . . it is one of the those books into which you can dip at random and find something interesting."


- Sunday Telegraph
"Successful as Hoare's book is in expanding its encyclopedic sources, it also has a personal thread, detailing his own fascination with whales. . . . The author describes his experiences swimming with sperm whales off the Azores, and his prose rises admirably to the demands of the encounter."


- Financial Times