Ocean conservation has never been a more urgent topic than it is today, but we need new ways to think about the water around us. Not just as a resource, but as an environment. One that covers 70 percent of our planet, and is home at least 240,000 marine species, and likely 500,000 to 10 million more. Come hear New York- and Hawaii-based author and journalist James Sturz read from his new novel Underjungle, a tale of love, loss, family, and war—set entirely underwater—and discuss the romance, mystery, and appeal of the deep, our connection to the water, and what we can find in it far beyond minerals and food.
In a novel being heralded as “wondrously beautiful,” “weirdly gorgeous,” “brilliant,” and “as profound as the seas” by some of our best-known ocean conservationists, underwater explorers, and writers today—including Jean-Michel Cousteau, Carl Safina, Paul Watson, Sy Montgomery, Shelby Van Pelt, and Junot Díaz—Sturz will make listeners feel they’re deep in the ocean themselves, in a story full of surge, saturation, heartache, rhythms and currents, and some shimmering fish. Sturz’s message is this: until we understand what the ocean is—how it moves, what it’s like to be in it, and what it means to rely on it for everything you know and you need—there will never be any real conservation, because the ocean will be something we study instead of something we love.
Sturz’s articles about the ocean have appeared in The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times and The New York Times Magazine, Outside, Men’s Journal, Travel + Leisure, and National Geographic Adventure, among many others, and his fiction and journalism have been published in 18 countries, and translated into nine languages. Additionally, Sturz is PADI divemaster, ice diver, free diver, and Explorers Club fellow. Q&A to follow. Books will be available at the museum for purchase.
This program is free for members and included in admission for non-members. Registration is required.
