The Nature of Things

In twenty-one engaging essays, Dallas Lore Sharp explores the natural world in lively and readable prose. He concentrates on the small scale of the natural world, a focus that highlights the grandness of nature as a whole. Sharp was born in 1870 in Haleyville, Cumberland County, New Jersey. After a childhood spent exploring the fields, forests, and swamps of South Jersey, he attended Brown University and eventually became Professor of English at Boston University. Writing in the first quarter of the twentieth century, Sharp was among the most popular nature writers of his time. He mused on aspects of nature that could be found in one's backyard, and sometimes further afield, successfully translating the wild world into his readers' living rooms. This is the second selection of Sharp's work published by the South Jersey Culture & History Center.