A short life of the author
George Beals Schaller (born 26 May 1933) is an American field biologist, conservationist, and writer whose half-century of fieldwork with the world’s most iconic large mammals — mountain gorillas, Bengal tigers, African lions, snow leopards, giant pandas, and Tibetan antelope — has produced some of the most important wildlife science and some of the finest nature writing of the twentieth century. He is, by general consensus, the most important field biologist of his generation and a writer whose literary gifts place him in the tradition of Darwin, Wallace, and Humboldt.
Life and Career
Schaller was born in Berlin and moved to the United States as a young man. He studied zoology at the University of Alaska and earned his Ph.D. at the University of Wisconsin under the ecologist John T. Emlen. His dissertation research — a study of mountain gorillas in what was then the Belgian Congo — produced the first systematic field study of gorilla behaviour and established the methodological approach he would use throughout his career: sustained, patient, largely solitary observation over months and years, combined with meticulous data collection and vivid field notes.
Schaller’s career with the Wildlife Conservation Society (then the New York Zoological Society) and later the Panthera Foundation took him to East Africa, India, the Himalayas, China, Mongolia, and the Tibetan Plateau. He has spent more time in remote wilderness with large predators and ungulates than virtually any other scientist alive.
The Year of the Gorilla (1964)
Schaller’s first popular book describes his 1959–1960 study of mountain gorillas in the Virunga Mountains of the eastern Congo. Before Schaller, gorillas were perceived primarily through the lens of King Kong — as ferocious, dangerous animals. Schaller’s observations revealed them to be gentle, social, vegetarian creatures living in stable family groups led by a dominant silverback male. His work laid the foundation for Dian Fossey’s subsequent research (Fossey initially consulted Schaller before beginning her own gorilla study) and for the conservation efforts that have saved the mountain gorilla from extinction.
The Serengeti Lion (1972)
Schaller’s three-year study of the lion population in the Serengeti — involving over 2,900 hours of direct observation — produced the definitive scientific monograph on lion behaviour and ecology. The book analyses hunting behaviour, social structure, reproduction, territorial dynamics, and the lion’s relationship with other predators and prey species. It won the National Book Award and remains the foundation of all subsequent lion research.
Stones of Silence (1980)
Perhaps Schaller’s finest book as a writer, Stones of Silence describes his search for snow leopards in the mountains of Pakistan and the Himalayas. The snow leopard is one of the most elusive large cats in the world, and Schaller’s account of tracking it through high-altitude wilderness — in conditions of extreme cold, altitude, and isolation — is a masterpiece of nature writing. The book is also a meditation on the relationship between scientific observation and aesthetic experience, and on the threats that human development poses to the last wild places.
Peter Matthiessen’s The Snow Leopard (1978), which describes a joint expedition with Schaller to the Crystal Mountain in Nepal, offers a complementary perspective: Matthiessen’s book is spiritual and personal; Schaller’s is scientific and observational. Together they constitute one of the great double accounts in nature writing.
Other Major Works
The Deer and the Tiger (1967) is Schaller’s study of prey and predator ecology in India’s Kanha National Park. Mountain Monarchs (1977) treats wild sheep and goats of the Himalayas. The Last Panda (1993) describes his work with giant pandas in China and is sharply critical of both Chinese conservation bureaucracy and the international panda industry. Tibet’s Hidden Wilderness (1997) and A Naturalist and Other Beasts (2007) extend his work into Central Asia.
Collecting Schaller
The Year of the Gorilla (1964, University of Chicago Press) in first edition brings $50–$200. The Serengeti Lion (1972, University of Chicago Press) brings $100–$400. Stones of Silence (1980) brings $30–$100. Signed copies are available but not common; Schaller spends most of his time in the field rather than at book signings.