Man and Qther Pests

SILENT SPRING. By RachelCarson.

HoughtonMifflin Co. 368 pp. $S.
Marstort Rates

WE) OF Westernclvdizationareapt

to
considerourselvesthecrowning
glol y
of evolutionary development - thc end
towardwhich
life hasbeenstruggling
throughthesevaststretches
of t m e .
But from the polnt
of vlew of t h e biosphere, of thecomplexweb
of living
thrngsformedthroughthesepast
eons,
man often looks more lrlce an evolutionai37 mlstake than a crowning glory. CWillzed man,fromthlsviewpoint,
IS a
d m a s e of thebiosphere,destroylngthe
naturalsystemand
111 greatdanger
of
destl-oylng himself aswell.
This gloomy view 1s most often based
or
on thehazards
of nuclearwarfare
themadlymultiplyinghumanpopulat~on.Butmanyotherthreatsto
our
survival,andtothesurvival
of evcry
living t11mg around us, areasserlous if
less obv~ous.Amongthcse
is our Increasingdependence on themassapplicatioll of powerful chemlcal poisons for
thecontrol
of organisms we consider
- insectsand
nulsances
or
dangers
weeds. This ~~articul~u- threat to nature
- maninchded - IS thesubject of
Rachel Carsons most
recent
book,
Szlertt Spr m g .
Miss
Carson
achieved
international
famea
few years agowlththegreat
success of T h e Sea Aromtd U s Her other
books, the earlier Under t h e Sea W r x d
a n d thelater
The Edge of t h e Sen,
also dealt with t h e ever fascinatlng subject of theoceansandthelrmargins.
Now she hasleft the celebratlon of the
wonders of the natural world to look a t
man and 111s effect on that world.
MissCarson
is indignantaboutthe
unexpected effects of our
thoughtless
broadcasting of pesticides. She writes
persuasively,forshehastakengreat
painstogatherandcheckherfacts.
Parts ol the book werepublished
in
The New Torte7 magazine last summer,
and immediately provoked wlde Interest,
discussion andcontroversy.Thisreac-

MARSTO
B AN T E S ,
profesJor of
zoology at the UwivegsEty of iVizcltignn,
is the awtltor, amol.rg other books, of
R4an in Nature (Prelztice-Hall), The
Forest andthe Sea ( R a n d o m H o z w e ) ,
T h e Prevalence of People (Scribmr).

202

tion wdl undoubtcdly intensify with the

publlcation of thc book. No one IS 111 a
better posltion than Miss Carson t o
arouse t h e rndlgnatlon of the publlc and
the conscience of the cbemlcal Industry,
and I t may well be that she has made a
real contl-lbutlon to our salvation.

WE have been usinginsecticldes

since
themiddle
of thelastcentury,when
arsenicalsprayswere
developed These
were polsonous enough, and i danger to
man as well as t o Insects. But the dangersInherent
in theinsecticldes
used
before
the
Second World
War
were
trlvial compared with those of the chemicals that have been developed recently.
Thefirst of thenew chemlcalswas
DDT. It was synthesized by a German
chemlst in 1874, but
its
miraculous
powers as aninsectlcidewerenot
dis1939, throughthe
work
covereduntil
of ;1 SWISS,PaulMuller. The Germans
andthenthe
Allies found i t to be extremely efflclent in controlling t h e body
llce so notorlouslyassbciatedwlthwar.
It wasspectacularly successful in conof typhusinItaly
trollmganoutburst
in 1943, and I t was soon found also to
beapotentagent
of destruction for
malaria-carrying mosquitoes. The typhus
experience, as MissCarsonpointsout,
mayhave
glven DDT anundeserved
reputation for
ha]-mlessness,
since in
powderform i t is notreadllyabsorbed
skm. Formostpurposes,
throughthe
however, the chemical I S dissolved in
011, and 111 t h ~ sform it is definitely tox~c
- not only for insects but for men and
other animals.
A Iong series of other organic insecticldes has been developedsmcethe
drscovery of the potency of DDT, some of
themmuchmorepowerful
poisons. A t
the san1e time, there has been a parallcl
development of herbictdes, "weed-killers Miss Carson explores tlw chemistry
andtoxlclty of thesevarious chemicaIs
111 somedetiilShehas,
of course, dug
upthemostobviousandextreme
cases
of poisoning toprove
her points,and
defendkrs of thepesticldes
wlll argue
that these Instances are trivial
in terms
OE the numbers of persons exposed. But
again and agam she points out that the
poss~blemass effects on people are subtle
and thattheacuteincidents,pathetic
as they are, are most important as warn-

ings of whatmaybehappening
lcss
obvlously - warnlngs that have largely
been ignored,
MISS Carson
greatly
is
concerncd
with the toxiclty of these chemicals for
man: butshe is, i t seems to me, even
moreconcernedwiththe
effect of their
use on thenaturalecosystem;shehas
written, incidentally but clearly, a treatlse on ecology, on themterrelatlons of
animals, p l a n t sa n dt h ee ~ ~ v ~ r o n m e ~ l t .
Ecology may well be the most Important
of the sciences from the viewpoint of
long-term
human
survival, lbut i t is
amongthoseleastunderstood
by the
genera1 public,andleastsupportedby
research. Modern man has got the
Idea
thathecanrearrangenature
for
his
own lmmedlate purposes - thisbrash
newcomer
regards
the
ancicnt
planet
of. life purely as
anditspersistingweb
aresource
for 111s species. T h e Idea
comes from his undeniablyimpressive
engineering accompbshments.
But
the
engineershavenotrepealedany
of tlrc
laws of nature;theyhavelearnedto
work wlth them. We can shoot ourselves
out Into space,perhaps
to the moon,
but we havenotcanceledthclaw
af
gravlty: If
jump froma cliff, we land
withasplash
- unless we use aparachute.

THE LAWS of ecology are cqually valid,

though far morecolnplexand
less we11
understood.Theunexpected
effects of
the mass spraymgs show
how foolhardy
i t is toundertakelarge-scaleinterventlon wlthoutflrstattemptingtounderstandtherelatlonshipsamongthe
organlsms InvoIved Miss Carson citescase
after case: themassmurder
of buds
fromthe wholesale spraying for Dutch
elm disease (whicbincideotallyturned
out to be a poor way of colltrolling the
disease); the death of fish fro111 forest
spraying; the destruction of the delicate
complex of organisms that supports soil
fertllity. Most puzzling are the esternlinationcam~~aigns,likethatagainst
the
f m a n t i n the South, which often h a ~ c
little effect on ,the target insect andinc~dentally create far more damage than
the pest Itself. These insecticides, Miss
Carson notes, are not selective poisons;
they do not single outtheone
specics
of which we desire toberid.Each
OF
them is used for the simple reason that
i t is a deadly poison. It therefore poisons
all llfe with which it comes in con-

tact. , .

MissCarson, I thinkunfortunately,
does not mentum the successful extermination campalgns.agamsttheMedlterranean fruit fly in Florida, the
African
Afloplzelesgambiae
in
malariavector,
B r a da n dt h e
sameinsect inEgypt.
I n each of these cases, the victory was
won over a recentlyintroduced species,
stillinunstablerelationshipwlththe
new environment.Theextermination of
the yellow-fever mosquitofrommany
ctties also involves a species that, in
America, has never been able t o establlsh itself innature,awayfromman.
These successes undoubtedly led to the
generalized enthusiasm for campaigns
of extermmation;butthey
seem to me
really to drive home MissCarsons point,
insofaras the success in each casewas
a consequence of quiteabnormal
circumstances.

THE NEW insecticides have turned out

to 3befailures in many instances because

iusectshave shown a surprisingability
to aevelop resistance or even immunity.
Up. to now, as the mosquitoes, flies or
beetles have developed immunity t o one

compound, we have usually been able to

come up withanother - butthls can
per:
hnldly be a n unendmggameand
haps the insects will win after all. It IS
the abundant pest that
develops immunity, while all of the assoclated animals,
importantinmaintainingthedelicate
balance of nature, continue to die.
MISSCarson is not opposed to chernlcal pesticides. she 1s opposed tothelr
indiscriminateandthoughtless
use. She
sums up the argument in her concluding
paragraph:
The
control
of nzture is a
phrase concelved In arrogance,born
of theNeanderthal
age of ,biology
and philosophy, when ~tWRS supposed
that nature exists for the convenience
of man. Theconceptsandpractices
of applied entomology for themost
part date from that Stone Age of science. It is ouralarmingmisfortune
that so primitive a science has armed
itself with the most modern and terrible weapons, and that in turnlng
themagainsttheinsects
it has also
turnedthemagainsttheearth.

Dear Shadows
DUBLIN IN THE AGE OF WILLIAM
BUTLER
YEATS
AND JAMES
JOYCE. By Richard M. Kain. Uni-

rudimentary map, but no photographs

It does not inform the curlous that the
Vico Road is inKilliney or that Yeats
versity of Oklahoma Press. 216 pp. was borninSandympunt
Avenue. It
$2.75.
assumes the company of intelligent men
and womentalkingabouttheIreland
Denis Donoghue
of Yeats, Joyce, AE, Synge, Lady GregI SHALL BE unfair t o Richard Kains ory, Michael Collins, ArthurGnffith,
new book, partly because its virtues are
Sean OCasey. all the fish bothgreat
those I could not even begin t o acquire. and small; and I t directs the conversaThe book is all generos~ty,all warmth, tionwithquiet
grace. (I have neve1
all affection, and I vote for these quali- heardsuchaconversation
in Dublin,
ties as ardently as thenextmanand
wetraffic in mockery, daily spite, t h e
wish that I could have them personally homici,dal laugh.)
as a bonus; but I should guess that Mr.
Theconversation
is designedto
inKain is willing tohavethemevenat
terest,
to
amuse, to
remove
certam
therisk of missing theastringency,the
obstacles of ignorance, to open the right
salt,the rigor, which I value so much door attherightmomentwhena
bein criticism. For me, criticism is the wilderedflgure
arriveswith UlyrJ*es or
hygiene of literature; for Mr. Kain, it is T h e Tower in his/herhand.Wemeet
animated
conversation
around
?he thls figure veryregularlyinIreland;
poems fire.
usuallyan American. likethe girl who
D u b l i n i n ,the Age of Iieats
and
.Toyce asked me some years ago whether Joyce
is An animatedhandbook;not
a Cooks was a Catholic, and registered the blankness of desolation when I answered darkTour or a Baedeker or an encyclopedia
or a lecturers bottom drawer. ( I t has a lythathe
was nothing else Mr.Kam
would have b:en morehelpful.he
has
DBNIS DONOGHUE, author of The all thepatience in the world, all the
Third Voice (Primetoll
UuiverJity
good will, and now he has written this
Press),,teaches at UniversityCollege,
book t o help that American girl. True,
D z b b h ? and was director of the fwJt he does not answer theCatholic quesInter?tational Y e a t s Szlmnter Scltool, ant tion,.buthetalks
t o the girl about
Sligo in 1960.
1916 and all that,
Irishhistory,Easter

October 6, 1962

the Black and Tans, Parnell, John

QLeary, theFamme.theLanecontroversy;andattheend
of the book the
So the book
gul feels muchhappler
wasnecessary.Anglo-Irish
literature IS
incorrigibly mired in fact,event,
personality, gossip, argument,
time
and
place An Irishreaderwhohasnever
been toHarvard, seenhoneysuckle,
or
owned a watchcanstillmake
somethmg of T h e Sound a n d t h e Fzwy, but
Panlells Funeral must be impenetrable
toareader
who 1s Ignorant of Emmet.
Tone,Fltzgelald,
OConnell theGreat
Cornedlan, de Valera, Cosgrave, OHlggins, ODuffy and a multitude of attendantIrlsh facts.

A REMARKABLE
number

of these
facts are housed in Mr Kains book, and
I know of no other book 111 whlch they
are set out so warmly. Yet I wonder. To
each hls own Ireland, yes, and it IS great
to beforgiven, but Mr. Kain will not
even l e t us confess our sins. The reader
who finlshes Mr. Knins genial book
will go on to read Yeats and Joyce and
I think he ndl often be shocked to find
theresuchbitterness,suchvenom;he
may wonder whether Mr Kam hns not
softened the facts with his own charity.
If the same reader meets Austin Clarkes
satires
and
T h e Valley of Sqzlintzng
V k d o w s and Denis Johnstons plays
and Sean OCaseys autoblographm,he
may begin tosuspectthattheCeltic
glory is In the eye of the Louisville beholder.
But I should not maketoomuch
of
this;
the
facts
are
there,
Mr.
Kain
knows them all, and he is entitled t o his
own voice. I n a bigger book, a longer
conversation,he
would perhapssaya
good deal moreabouttheelement
of
fantasyinIrlshliterature,
wild things
llke King Goslzawk and At-Swim-TwoBirdr, and
little
a more
about
the
satirists
and
the
nineteenth-centu~y
translators and the Gaellc poets treated
lovinglyin
Damel Corkerys The Hidd e n Ireland. B u t a blgger book is a dlfferent O C C ~ S I O ~
Many readers of Mr. Kains new book
w ~ l l aIready know h ~ sF U ~ ~ OVoyZ U
ager, stdlthemosthelpful
elucidation
of Ulysrer. The newbookhasmany
of theearlierqualities,notably
a marvelous tact, a willingness t o explam and
then to be d e n t when the road is reasonablyclear. But it loses a little of that
steady
focus
which made FabulozLs
Voyager so firm;thewiderscreenand
the blgger castarenotmanagedwith
quitetheongi,nal
deftness. I n some of
thetransitions
from person to person,
t o another,
the
sentences
one
event

2cj3