David Suzuki: The Autobiography

321 Pages·2006·4.48 MB·English

by  David Suzuki

DAVID SUZUKI
THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY
DAVID SUZUKI
THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY
Copyright © 2006 by David Suzuki
06 07 08 09 10 5 4 3 2
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval
system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior written
consent of the publisher or a license from The Canadian Copyright Licensing
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For a copyright license, visit www.accesscopyright.ca or call toll free to 1-800-
893-5777.
Greystone Books
A division of Douglas & McIntyre Ltd.
2323 Quebec Street, Suite 201
Vancouver, British Columbia
Canada V5T 4S7
www.greystonebooks.com
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Suzuki, David, 1936–
David Suzuki: the autobiography.
Includes index.
ISBN-13: 978-1-55365-156-7
ISBN-10: 1-55365-156-1
1. Suzuki, David, 1936–. 2. Environmentalists—Canada—Biography.
3. David Suzuki Foundation. 4. Authors, Canadian (English)—20th
century—Biography. 5. Broadcasters—Canada—Biography. I. Title.
GE56.S99A3 2006 333.72′092 C2006-900541-9
Editing by Nancy Flight Copyediting by Wendy Fitzgibbons Jacket design by
Jessica Sullivan & Naomi MacDougall Front jacket photographs: top left, top
right, middle right, and bottom left: courtesy of the CBC; bottom right: Chick
Rice Back jacket photograph courtesy of the CBC Text design by Lisa
Hemingway
Printed and bound in Canada by Friesens
Printed on acid-free paper that is forest friendly
(100% post-consumer recycled paper) and has been processed chlorine free
Distributed in the U.S. by Publishers Group West
We gratefully acknowledge the financial support of the Canada Council for the
Arts, the British Columbia Arts Council, and the Government of Canada through
the Book Publishing Industry Development Program (BPIDP) for our publishing
activities.
With deepest gratitude,
I thank and dedicate this book to the general public,
who made my life's work possible.
You watched and listened to my programs;
you read, thought about, and responded to
ideas I expressed in writing.
Your support added weight and
visibility to my efforts and carried me past
numerous roadblocks and detractors.
That support has been a great honor, privilege,
and responsibility, which I have tried in my fallible, human
way to live up to.
My life and career in the university, research, and media
would not have been possible without the generous and enthusiastic
support of so many people in so many ways.
With all my heart, I extend thanks to:
My elders—Mom, Dad, Freddy, Harry
My anchor and the love of my life—Tara
The future—Tamiko, Troy, Laura, Severn, Sarika,
Tamo, Midori, Jonathan
The many students, postdocs, and associates who made my lab
such a vibrant, exciting, and productive community
The dozens of CBC radio and television staff, freelance researchers,
writers, and media professionals whose efforts have made me look good,
a job that Jim Murray reminded me is not easy
The hundreds of volunteers, staff, and associates who have made
the foundation such a supportive, joyful, and positive community
The tens of thousands of people who have contributed to
the foundation so generously
Elois Yaxley, for bringing some order to my life
Rob Sanders of Greystone Books and Patrick Gallagher
of Allen & Unwin Publishers for steadfast support and encouragement
Nancy Flight and Wendy Fitzgibbons for making this prose readable
And my kid sister Aiko, who taught me so much about life
and who died on the eve of 2006
CONTENTS
Preface
ONE My Happy Childhood in Racist British Columbia
TWO College and a Burgeoning Career
THREE A New Career
FOUR Stand-ups and Fall-downs
FIVE Family Matters
SIX Haida Gwaii and the Stein Valley
SEVEN Adventures in the Amazon
EIGHT Protecting Paiakan's Forest Home
NINE A Step Back in Time
TEN Down Under
ELEVEN Starting the David Suzuki Foundation
TWELVE Up and Running
THIRTEEN Rio and the Earth Summit
FOURTEEN Papua New Guinea
FIFTEEN Kyoto and Climate Change
SIXTEEN Reflections on Science and Technology
SEVENTEEN A Culture of Celebrity
EIGHTEEN Thoughts as I Grow Old
Index
PREFACE
IN 1986, THE year I turned fifty, I had the temerity to write
Metamorphosis: Stages in a Life. It was not intended as an autobiography but as
a series of essays. My publisher encouraged me to supplement the pieces with
more and more personal material, until the essays were reduced to three at the
end of the book. To my astonishment and delight, people were interested in my
experiences, and the book sold more copies than any other I have written. At the
time, at the relatively young age of half a century, I didn't feel I had matured
enough to have a perspective on my life. Now, two decades later, I know I was
still a child in maturity, and even now, looking in the mirror, I have difficulty
reconciling the old man gazing back at me with the still-young person in the
mind behind the face.
Although all people on Earth, as members of one species, share the same
anatomy of the brain, the same chemistry of neurons, and similar sense organs,
each of us “perceives” the world in a very personal way. We experience it
through perceptual filters that are shaped by our individual genes and
experiences, by our gender, ethnic group, religious background, socioeconomic
status, and so on. Essentially, our brains “edit” the input from our sensory
organs, “making sense” of it within the context of our personal history and the
values and beliefs we have come to acquire.
Now, as my aging body imposes limits and tells me to slow down, I spend
more time in reflection, trying to put my most memorable experiences into a
kind of order. It's the way scientists write up a research report or paper: we
follow different avenues of inquiry, going down blind alleys, hitting a fast lane
or taking a shortcut, zigzagging along as we probe an interesting observation or
phenomenon. Then, when it's time to “write it up,” we shuffle through the
experiments, tossing some out and organizing the remainder into an order that
creates the illusion that a direct path was taken from the initial question to the
final results.
So it is with my life story. I don't have a photographic memory (thank god),
and certain events that might have passed unnoticed by someone else may have
stuck in my mind, whereas other, seemingly more monumental moments have
faded away. This, then, is a story I have created by selectively dredging up bits
and pieces from the detritus of seventy years of life. The first five chapters skim
over the first fifty years, giving a somewhat different emphasis from that of