Jane Goodall is one of those people who are so iconic in this society that we forget that she's still alive, still working, still making discoveries that change the face of evolutionary studies every single day. The second of her autobiographies, BEYOND INNOCENCE, offers us a running commentary of her adult life, her work, her personal life, all the elements that make up the full life of Jane Goodall. Her letters home and those establishing the precedents of her scientific research are arranged in order of the events of her life, and the jovial and loving tone of these missives gives a special edge to the woman as scientist, writer, wife, mother, lover.

Besides the in-depth discussions about her family of apes, those who have survived polio (we are that close to apes that they are infected with the same diseases as man, with much the same frightening results), there are in-depth discussions about her family of man --- her first and second husbands, her divorce, but mostly, her love for her mom and all those back home who support her in a thousand different ways, and last but not least, her son, Grub, the "bushbaby" born in Africa, growing up on the Serengetti, a spry and intelligent rascal who delights his mother at every turn. It is a wonderful thing about BEYOND INNOCENCE that it can balance the seriousness and great import of Goodall's work with the besottedness she experiences through childbirth and child rearing. It is as if she is yet another example of how apes and humans share so many characteristics: passages about mother apes with their young, caring for sick babies, burying their dead, parallel some of Goodall's accounts home of young Grub's growing up, his successes, his messes, his wondrous childhood. BEYOND INNOCENCE is also the diary of a mother, a woman who lives her personal life to the hilt while exploring new frontiers for science's sake.

There is a great deal of tragedy and drama in BEYOND INNOCENCE --- some (like the kidnapping of her research team) screaming to be made into a film, some more personal and moving (her painful divorce and the death of her second husband). All in all, Goodall's homey prose and honest portrayals of the days and nights of herself and her ever-changing team of workers make BEYOND INNOCENCE a hard-to-put-down read. Hers is a life she could not even have imagined, and it is remarkable that she has been able to have the sort of real life and the career together that makes it a marker for feminists especially --- her priorities in place (family comes first), she wends her way through her work life without sacrificing the things most important to her. It is a valuable lesson for anyone to learn and fascinating reading besides. A triumphant look inside an important woman's life.

   --- Reviewed by Jana Siciliano


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