The Life of the Bee

In "The Life of the Bee," Nobel Prize winner Maurice Maeterlinck offers brilliant proof that "no living creature, not even man, has achieved in the center of his sphere, what the bee has achieved." From their amazingly intricate feats of architecture to their intrinsic sense of self-sacrifice, Maeterlinck takes a "bee's-eye view" of the most orderly society on Earth. A classic bee book written in a lively and readable style, "The Life of the Bee" is reasonably accurate (for a book of its vintage). In the words of Maurice Maeterlinck, "It is not my intention to write a treatise on apiculture, or on practical bee-keeping...I wish to speak of the bees very simply, as one speaks of a subject one knows and loves to those who know it not." It's safe to say that, in "The Life of the Bee," Maurice Maeterlinck succeeded in his goal very well. Maeterlinck, who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1911, played an important part in the Symbolist movement. A Belgian playwright, poet, and essayist, Maeterlinck wrote primarily about death and the meaning of life.