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Portrait of Rachel Carson

Rachel Carson

(1907–1964) Essayist United States

156 quotes in 903 categories

A low‑tide line opens a world as old as Earth, where water and earth meet in hidden rhythm. Carson reminds us that humility and wonder belong beside nature, not a lust for destruction. She also stresses that each of us must choose how to live with the planet.

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Rachel Carson was an essayist from the United States, best known for Silent Spring.

Quick Facts About Rachel Carson

Born: May 27, 1907
Died: April 14, 1964
Nationality: United States
Profession: Essayist
Notable works: Silent Spring
Known for: Silent Spring, The Edge of the Sea, The Sea Around Us

About Rachel Carson

Rachel Louise Carson was an American marine biologist, writer, and conservationist whose sea trilogy (1941–1955) and the 1962 book Silent Spring helped advance marine conservation and the global environmental movement.

Awards & Honors

Presidential Medal of Freedom Cullum Geographical Medal John Burroughs Medal Guggenheim Fellowship National Women's Hall of Fame National Book Award for Nonfiction Maryland Women's Hall of Fame Audubon Medal

Show 1 more awards

AAAS Kavli Science Journalism Award

Quotes by Rachel Carson

Those who love and free nature are never alone.

Environment

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The control of nature is a phrase conceived in arrogance.

Arrogance

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Beginnings are apt to be shadowy.

Beginnings

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Neanderthal age of biology and the convenience of man.

Age

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The edge of the sea is a strange and beautiful place.

Beautiful

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The Choice, after all, is ours to make.

Choice

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In nature nothing exists alone.

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“In the fish world many things are told by sound waves.”

Fish

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There is something infinitely healing in the repeated refrains of nature.

Beautiful earth

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But man is a part of nature, and his war against nature is inevitably a war against himself.

Inspirational

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Drink in the beauty and wonder at the meaning of what you see.

Beauty

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Nature reserves some of her choice rewards for days when her mood may appear to be somber.

Choices

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Every mystery solved brings us to the threshold of a greater one.

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As crude a weapon as a cave man's club, the chemical barrage has been hurled against the fabric of life.

Caves

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A child's world is fresh and new and beautiful, full of wonder and excitement.

Beautiful

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Then the song of a whitethroat, pure and ethereal, with the dreamy quality of remembered joy.

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If a child is to keep alive his inborn sense of wonder without any such gift from the fairies, he needs the…

Child

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“The more clearly we can focus our attention on the wonders and realities of the universe, the less taste we shall have…

Attention

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In an age when man has forgotten his origins and is blind even to his most essential needs for survival, water along…

Age

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It is a curious situation that the sea, from which life first arose, should now be threatened by the activities of one…

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The shore is an ancient world, for as long as there has been an earth and sea there has been this place…

Ancient

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There is no drop of water in the ocean, not even in the deepest parts of the abyss, that does not know…

Abyss

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The most alarming of all man's assaults upon the environment is the contamination of air, earth, rivers, and sea with dangerous and…

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It is a wholesome and necessary thing for us to turn again to the earth and in the contemplation of her beauties…

Beauty

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A child's world is fresh and new and beautiful, full of wonder and excitement. It is our misfortune that for most of…

Children

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Until we have the courage to recognize cruelty for what it is -- whether its victim is human or animal -- we…

Courage

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As crude a weapon as the cave man's club, the chemical barrage has been hurled against the fabric of life - a…

Image

Those who contemplate the beauty of the earth find reserves of strength that will endure as long as life lasts. There is…

Assurance

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We still talk in terms of conquest. We still haven't become mature enough to think of ourselves as only a tiny part…

Attitude

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If I had influence with the good fairy who is supposed to preside over the christening of all children I should ask…

Alienation

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“Until we have the courage to recognize cruelty for what it is... we cannot expect things to be much better in this…

Courage

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Those who dwell among the beauties and mysteries of the earth are never alone or weary of life. Those who contemplate the…

Attention

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“Only within the 20th Century has biological thought been focused on ecology, or the relation of the living creature to its environment.…

Connectedness

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“The wide-ranging birds that visit islands of the ocean in migration may also have a good deal to do with the distribution…

Birds

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We have looked first at man with his vanities and greed and his problems of a day or a year; and then…

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These sprays, dusts, and aerosols are now applied almost universally to farms, gardens, forests, and homes-nonselective chemicals that have the power to…

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The most alarming of all man's assaults upon the environment is the contamination of air, earth, rivers, and sea with dangerous and…

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Only within the 20th Century has biological thought been focused on ecology, or the relation of the living creature to its environment.…

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“A child’s world is fresh and new and beautiful, full of wonder and excitement. It is our misfortune that for most of…

Children

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Only yesterday mankind lived in fear of the scourges of smallpox, cholera and plague that once swept nations before them. Now our…

Cholera

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Rachel Carson by topic

Nature (58) Life (41) Environment (29) Earth (29) Silent spring (25) World (24) Men (24) Sea (20) Wonder (19) Environmental (19) Science (16) Children (15) Ocean (14) Water (13) Time (13) Beauty (13) Inspirational (11) Sense of wonder (10)