rachel carson's book silent spring published in the 1960s

When Silent Spring came out, she was already a well known author. With an undergraduate degree in biology and a master’s in zoology from Johns Hopkins, Carson in 1935 faced the prevailing prejudices of the time against women doing scientific research, and the only job she was able to get was as a writer of radio programs about the ocean, produced by the federal government department devoted to the study of forests and seas.įrom there, she went on to publish articles in magazines such as The Atlantic, The New Yorker and Colliers, which she published in a series and which later would become her first bestseller, The Edge of the Sea (A margem do mar, in Portuguese ) in 1952.

Nevertheless, from a young age she became involved in popularizing science, the cause to which she dedicated most of her life. People who knew Rachel Carson well described her as shy and introverted. The first edition of the volume with the full text, published by Houghton Mifflin, sold 600,000 copies in just one year.

Kennedy even appointed a commission to study the issue based on Carson’s conclusions. Senators and representatives in Congress talked about it and President John F.

Dozens of newspapers reprinted excerpts from the work and commented on it. The strength of the arguments and facts that Carson reported in the text about the use of pesticides and their effect on the environment and people was so compelling that it became an instant hit. This book by Rachel Carson caused such repercussions in the 1960s that even today it is considered one of the founding landmarks of the international environmental movement.Ĭarson was a scientist, but her name was included on the list of authors of the 100 best articles of the 20 th century by a jury of prominent journalists put together by New York University in 2000 to select them.Īctually Silent Spring was originally published by The New Yorker magazine, in parts, between June and July 1962. YALE COLLECTION OF AMERICAN LITERATURERachel Carson working YALE COLLECTION OF AMERICAN LITERATUREĪmong the semi-centennials of 2012, one of the most important and least celebrated was the publication of Silent Spring ( Primavera silenciosa, in Portuguese, reprinted in 2010 in Brazil by Editora Gaia).

Rachel carson's book silent spring published in the 1960s