The Soul of the White Ant 1937 Eugene Marais ~ First Edition ~ Pioneering Study of Termites ~ Entomology

Title: The Soul of the White Ant

Author: Eugene N. Marais / With a Biographical Note by his Son [Eugene Charles Gerard Marais] & translated by Winifred de Kok

Description: First American Edition. Black cloth with the title and a stylized termite stamped in white on the spine. Interior is clean and unmarked, crisp pages. Eight illustrated plates and eleven in-text drawings. Index. Dust jacket is worn; missing bottom third of spine; front panel chipped along fore-edge; not price clipped ($2.50); in an archival mylar sleeve. xv + 183, [1] pages.

Marais' pioneering work on the life of termites, here translated from the original Afrikaans edition of 1934, where he posits the theory that the organic unity of the termitary, the individual nest of termites, may be compared to organism of an animal, with the workers and soldiers resembling red and white blood corpuscles, the fungus gardens the digestive organs, the queen functioning as the brain, and the sexual flight being in every respect analogous to the escape of spermatozoa and ova. Based on twelve years of ceaseless study in the veld, Marais' theory, which he developed in the 1920s, received widespread, uncredited attention through the work of Maurice Maeterlinck.

Binding: Hardcover
Condition: Very Good+
Jacket Condition: Fair

Publisher: Dodd, Mead & Company
Place: New York
Year: 1937

Keywords: termites, termitary, entomology,