Biography gavin maxwell
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Gavin Maxwell - The author & naturalist who funnen paradise at Camusfeàrna.
Written bygd Gus Brydon
He has married me with a fingerprydnad, a fingerprydnad of bright water
Whose ripples travel from the heart of the sea,
He has married me with a ring of light, the glitter
Broadcast on the swift river.
He has married me with the sun’s circle
Too dazzling to see, traced in summer sky….
Kathleen Raine
The name Gavin Maxwell fryst vatten synonymous with the world’s best selling book ‘Ring of Bright Water’ published in 1960, about the otter Mijbil brought back from the Marshes of Iraq and in particular, a beautiful part of Scotland overlooking the romantic and rugged Isle of Skye.
Gavin named this area the ‘Bay of Alders’ (Camusfeàrna) and for twenty years he considered this to be his spiritual home. Mijbil had been orphaned and rescued by the great explorer Wilfred Thesiger, who Maxwell had been travelling with through Ir
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Gavin Maxwell
Scottish natural historian and author (1914–1969)
For the canoer, see Gavin Maxwell (canoeist).
Gavin MaxwellFRSLFZSFRGS (15 July 1914 – 7 September 1969) was a Scottish naturalist and author, best known for his non-fiction writing and his work with otters. He became most famous for Ring of Bright Water (1960) and its sequels, which described his experiences raising Iraqi and West African otters on the west coast of Scotland. One of his Iraqi otters was of a previously unknown sub-species which was subsequently named after Maxwell. Ring of Bright Water sold more than a million copies and was made into a film starring Bill Travers and Virginia McKenna in 1969.[2] His other books described sharking in the Hebrides and his travels in Iraq, Morocco, and Algeria, as well as studies of recent history in Sicily and Morocco.
Early life
[edit]Gavin Maxwell was the youngest son of Lieutenant-Colonel Aymer Maxwell and Lady Mary Percy,
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The Island of Eilean Bàn, Now a Stepping Stone for the Skye Bridge |
Gavin Maxwell lived from 15 July 1914 to 7 September 1969. He was a naturalist and author, best known for his work with otters. His most popular book was Ring of Bright Water, published in 1960. This described how he brought an otter back from Iraq and raised it in Scotland. The otter, Mijbil, was eventually identified as a previously unknown sub-species of the Smooth-coated Otter, since named after Maxwell: Lutrogale perspicillata maxwelli. The book went on to sell over a million copies and was made into a film. The sub-species Lutrogale perspicillata maxwelli may have fared less well: following extensive drainage of its natural environment in Iraq it is feared to be extinct.
Maxwell was born and brought up in the tiny settlement of Elrig, north of Port William in Dumfries and Galloway, an area in which his family had owned estates fo