William Henry Hudson


William Henry Hudson was an author, naturalist, and ornithologist.

Life

Hudson was born in Quilmes, a few miles southeast of Buenos Aires, Argentina. He was the son of Daniel Hudson and his wife Catherine, United States settlers of English and Irish origin.
In 1846 the family established a pulpería further south, in the surroundings of Chascomús, not far from the lake of the same name. In this natural enviroment, Hudson spent his youth studying the local flora and fauna and observing both natural and human dramas on what was then a lawless frontier, while publishing his ornithological work in Proceedings of the Royal Zoological Society initially in an English mingled with Spanish idioms. He had a special love for Patagonia.
Hudson settled in England during 1874, taking up residence at St Luke's Road in Bayswater.
In 1876 he married Emily Wingrave in London. Hudson was a friend of the late nineteenth century English author George Gissing, whom he met in 1889. They corresponded up until the latter's death in 1903, occasionally exchanging their publications, discussing literary and scientific matters and commenting on their respective access to books and newspapers, a matter of supreme importance to Gissing.
Towards the end of his life, Hudson moved to Worthing in Sussex, England. His grave is in Broadwater and Worthing Cemetery in Worthing.

Books

He produced a series of ornithological studies, including Argentine Ornithology and British Birds, and later achieved fame with his books on the English countryside, including Hampshire Days, Afoot in England and A Shepherd's Life, which helped foster the back-to-nature movement of the 1920s and 1930s and was set in Wiltshire.
Hudson's best-known novel is Green Mansions, and his best-known non-fiction is Far Away and Long Ago, which was made into a film.

Scientific views

Hudson was an advocate of Lamarckian evolution. He was a critic of Darwinism and defended vitalism. He was influenced by the non-Darwinian evolutionary writings of Samuel Butler. He was an early member of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds.

Recognition and awards

referred to Hudson's The Purple Land in his novel The Sun Also Rises, and to Far Away and Long Ago in his posthumous novel The Garden of Eden. He listed Far Away and Long Ago in a suggested reading list for a young writer.
James Rebanks' 2015 book The Shepherd's Life about a Lake District farmer was inspired by Hudson's work of the same name: "But even more than Orwell or Hemingway, W.H. Hudson turned me into a book obsessive...", and: "One day, I pulled A Shepherd's Life by W.H. Hudson from the bookcase...and the sudden life-changing realization it gave me that we could be in books - great books."
In Argentina, Hudson is considered to belong to the national literature as Guillermo Enrique Hudson, the Spanish version of his name. A town in Berazategui Partido and several other public places and institutions are named after him. The town of Hudson in Buenos Aires Province is named for him.

Works