Percival probed the volcanic origins of rock via geology and the
seething nature of his psyche via poetry
Stone Breaker is an in-depth, accessible biography of a true American
polymath, James Gates Percival. A poet, linguist, and unstable savant
Percival was also a brilliant geologist who walked thousands of miles
crisscrossing first Connecticut and then Wisconsin to lay the foundation
for the work of generations of Earth scientists. Exploring the
confluences of literature, art, and geology, Kathleen L. Housley reveals
how one of most famous poets of the 1820's became a renowned geologist
with his groundbreaking 1843 work Report on the Geology of the State of
Connecticut. 35 color images include historic photographs and paintings
of the Connecticut landscape.