The Life of the Bee by Maurice Maeterlinck
Philosophy and provocations from France, 1901 in "The Life of the Bee" by Maurice Maeterlinck
Whilst most resources that I use for my research into Honeybee Histories are digital; either online or pdf versions of books and articles, or scanned copies of original sources, I still prefer physical texts whenever I can get my hands on them. Often this will be via a library visit of some kind, but just occasionally I will buy a new book or find one in a second-hand or charity store.
Recently, a chance find led me to the interesting work of Maurice Maeterlinck. I had never heard of him before nor realised that he had written so much about honeybees. His essays are full of provocations; not so much a guide to beekeeping or a scientific study, but more a philosophical interrogation of known knowledge about honeybees and beekeeping.
There is a lot to find in his work, so I won’t even attempt to cover it all here. But I thought it would be useful to take a quick dive into his ideas with a few examples. This is nothing more than a preliminary glance at this stage, but I have a feeling I will be returning to his words in future Honeybee Histories essays. He covers a lot of topics and provides what I feel are some useful reflections.
So, without any further ado, here is Maurice Maeterlinck and his “The life of the Bee”.
