The Roots of Heaven
By Romain Gary
Categories: Literature & Fiction
The Roots of Heaven is a novel by the French writer Romain Gary, first published in 1956 as Les Racines du ciel. It won the Prix Goncourt that year and is often described as one of the first ecological novels. In French Equatorial Africa, a former prisoner of war named Morel campaigns to stop the slaughter of elephants, first by petition and then by force. As his cause draws followers and enemies, the book asks what people owe to nature and to one another.
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