Recommended Science Writing

Below is a list of science writing that could be used in your AP English Language and Composition course. For the article that discusses how to incorporate these or other science texts in your course, click here.

Books

Angier, Natalie, ed. The Best American Science and Nature Writing 2002. New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2002.

Bacon, Francis. Novum Organum in Francis Bacon: The Major Works. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002.

Brockman, John, ed. The Next Fifty Years: Science in the First Half of the Twenty-First Century. New York: Vintage Books, 2002.

Carson, Rachel. Silent Spring. Boston: Mariner Books, 2002.

Dawkins, Richard. A Devil's Chaplain: Reflections on Hope, Lies, Science, and Love. New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2003.

____________, ed. The Best American Science and Nature Writing 2003. New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2003.

Eiseley, Loren. The Immense Journey: An Imaginative Naturalist Explores the Mysteries of Man and Nature. New York: Vintage Books, 1959.

____________. The Night Country. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1971.

Ferris, Timothy, ed. The Best American Science Writing 2001. New York: Harper Collins, 2001.

Fortey, Richard. Life: A Natural History of the First Four Billion Years of Life on Earth. New York: Vintage Books, 1999.

____________. Trilobite: Eyewitness to Evolution. New York: Vintage Books, 2001.

Gleick, James, ed. The Best American Science Writing 2000. New York: Harper Collins, 2000.

Gould, Stephen Jay. Ever Since Darwin: Reflections in Natural History. New York: Norton, 1992.

____________. Dinosaur in a Haystack: Reflections in Natural History. New York: Harmony Books, 1995.

____________. The Flamingo's Smile: Reflections in Natural History. New York: Norton, 1985.

____________. The Hedgehog, the Fox, and the Magister's Pox: Mending the Gap Between Science and the Humanities. New York: Harmony Books, 2003.

Kaplan, Robert. The Nothing that Is: A Natural History of Zero. New York: Oxford University Press, 1999.

Kuhn, Thomas S. The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996.

Lester, James D. Of Bunsen Burners, Bones, and Belles Lettres: Classic Essays Across the Curriculum. New York: NTC/Contemporary Publishing Company, 1995.

Medawar, Peter. Pluto's Republic: Incorporating the Art of the Soluble and Induction Intuition in Scientific Thought. New York: Oxford University Press, 1984.

Otis, Laura, ed. Literature and Science in the Nineteenth Century: An Anthology. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002.

Pinker, Steven, ed. The Best American Science and Nature Writing 2004. New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2004.

____________. How The Mind Works. New York: Norton, 1999.

Quammen, David, ed. The Best American Science and Nature Writing 2000. New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2000.

Ridley, Matt, ed. The Best American Science Writing 2002. New York: Harper Collins, 2002.

Sacks, Oliver, ed. The Best American Science Writing 2003. New York: Harper Collins, 2003.

Sagan, Carl. The Dragons of Eden: Speculations on the Evolution of Human Intelligence. New York: Ballantine Books, 1978.

Sobel, Dava, ed. The Best American Science Writing 2004. New York: Harper Collins, 2004.

Snow, C.P. The Two Cultures and A Second Look: An Expanded Version of the Two Cultures and the Scientific Revolution. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1964.

Thomas, Lewis. The Lives of a Cell: Notes of a Biology Watcher. New York: Penguin Books, 1978.

____________. The Medusa and the Snail: More Notes of a Biology Watcher. New York: Penguin Books, 1995.

Weiner, Jonathan. The Beak of the Finch. New York: Vintage Books, 1995.

Wilson, Edward O. On Human Nature. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1978.

____________, ed. The Best American Science and Nature Writing 2001. New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2001.

Science Magazines

Discover
National Geographic
Natural History
Scientific American
Science Times (every Tuesday inside the New York Times)
Smithsonian

Magazines that Include Science Writing

The Atlantic Monthly
Harper's
The New Yorker

Authored by

Lawrence Scanlon
Brewster High School
Brewster, New York