David Suzuki is a revered elder statesman of the environmental movement and this is a rare chance to hear his message and pay tribute to the man. No-one says it better than fellow Canadian author and social activist Margaret Atwood, in her foreword to this book: ‘We should thank Dr Suzuki for the gifts he has given, and find within ourselves the grace to pass them on”.

Am looking for a real non Kindle edition. Anyone know of one?

Renowned, both within Canada and the international scientific community, geneticist and environmentalist David Suzuki is best known, by me anyways, for his involvement with the CBC TV series The Nature of Things, which he has hosted since 1972. The Legacy is based upon a lecture that Suzuki gave in December 2009 at the University of British Columbia. I did not have the opportunity to hear his lecture in person, so I was quite happy to discover that this book is based upon that lecture and is the culmination of Suzuki's knowledge and wisdom to date - he is only in his 70's so one can only guess what may still be to come!

With forward written by Canadian author Margaret Atwood, The Legacy shows, in the written word, Suzuki's amazing skill at presenting the mysteries of nature and science in succinct, layman's terms. In less than 100 pages, Suzuki manages to summaries the earth's evolutionary process, explain the four elements of Earth, Air, Fire and Water and tie these elements into Biodiversity, while still managing a brilliant minor side-step into the discussion of economics - how relentless growth is both a mathematical and an economic impossibility, ecology, borders as a strictly human creation that goes counter to the very laws of nature, and even touches on the whole nature/nurture question - Answer: one cannot exist without the other and on that note, is a completely pointless question.

The take away from this amazing work - that the elders, the ones that have lived the past and seen the changes that now comprise our present remind us that, in the words of Bernard Lown, "We must convince each generation that they are transient passengers on this planet earth. It does not belong to them. They are not free to doom generations yet unborn. They are not at liberty to erase humanity's past nor dim its future."

In a word, brilliant, especially the personalization that the change beings with each of us, then with our families, our communities, our country and the world. Suzuki closes off by listing off some attainable goals based on his childhood memories and attainable dreams: clean drinkable water in any river or lake, logging forests according to the principles of ecosystem-based management, cities built to optimally capture all the natural rhythms of the seasons - maximize sunlight, rooftop gardens, capture waterfall from rain. ( )