they lived in cities, were a few blocks away from farmland or wilderness ... At the risk of sounding countercultural, I suspect that thinkers who live in sealed, air-conditioned boxes and work by artificial light (I am one) are as unnatural as apes in cages at zoos. Naturalists like Eiseley in that sense are the most normal human beings to be found among intellectuals, because they spend a lot of time outdoors and know the names of the plants and animals they see ... For all of his scientific erudition, Eiseley has a poetic, even cinematic, imagination. Purposes of his writings Richard Wentz describes what he feels are the significance and purposes of Eiseley's writings:"For Loren Eiseley, writing itself becomes a form of contemplation. Contemplation is a kind of human activity in which the mind, spirit and body are directed in solitude toward some other. Scholars and critics have not yet taken the full measure of contemplation as an art that is related to the purpose of all scholarly activity – to see things as they really are ... Using narrative, parable and exposition, Eiseley has the uncanny ability to make us feel that we are accompanying him on a journey into the very heart of the universe. Whether he is explicating history or commenting on the ideas of a philosopher, a scientist or a theologian, he takes us with him on a personal visit." However, because of Eiseley's intense and poetic writing style and his focus on nature and cosmology, he was not accepted or understood by most of his colleagues. "You," a friend told him, "are a freak, you know. A God-damned freak, and life is never going to be easy for you. You like scholarship, but the scholars, some of them, anyhow, are not going to like you because you don't stay in the hole where God supposedly put you. You keep sticking your head out and looking around. In a university that's inadvisable." 1950s The Immense Journey (1957) His first book, The Immense Journey, was a collection of writings about the history of humanity, and it proved to be that rare science book that appealed to a mass audience. It has sold over a million copies and has been published in at least 16 languages. Besides being his first book, The Immense Journey was also Eiseley's most well known book and established him as a writer