The Fly Trap

A rare memoir of extraordinary, mesmerizing brillianceand a Swedish bestsellerby an entomologist fascinated with the natural world and the hidden wonders of life, and which asks: What is it that drives the obsessively curious to exploration and the practice of collecting? Warm and humorous, self-deprecating and contemplative, The Fly Trap is a meditation on solitude, stillness, and the observation of beautybe it found among insects or in art. Weaving a fascinating web of associations, histories, and personal memories, the book begins with Fredrik Sjbergs own experience as an entomologist on a tranquil, remote Swedish island and pulls in the tales of past heroic scientific expeditions to Burma and the wilderness of Kamchatka. As confounded by his unusual love of collecting flies as anyone, Sjberg pauses to reflect on a range of ideasthe passage of time, art, freedomdrawing into dialogue writers such as Bruce Chatwin and D. H. Lawrence, and the lives of collectors such as Ren Edmond Malaise, inventor of the Malaise trap. From the everyday to the exotic, The Fly Trap revels in the wonders of the natural world.