Errol Fuller

Errol Fuller (born 19 June 1947) is an English writer and artist who lives in Tunbridge Wells, Kent. He was born in Blackpool, Lancashire, grew up in South London, and was educated at Addey and Stanhope School. He is the author of a series of books on extinction and extinct creatures.

Extinct Birds
Andrew Sugden, reviewing Extinct Birds (1987) in the London Review of Books, notes that Fuller set out "to find at least one drawing, painting or lithograph: many by the great 19th-century illustrator J.G. Keulemans, a couple (great auk and Himalayan mountain quail) by Edward Lear. He also embellishes the historical account where possible with portraits of the sailors, explorers and naturalists who recorded (and sometimes helped to extinguish) a species and biographical snippets about them – all of which provides an important context for the extinctions themselves. Most of these species vanished, of course, before we had film of sufficient speed for wildlife photography", he found little to say about some of the species, "the lives and deaths of many species having passed almost unnoticed (which makes it all the more remarkable that Fuller was able to unearth so many pictures)", and contrasts this 18th century situation with what happens now, when there is often a mass of data on vanishing species.

John A. Burton, reviewing the book in Oryx, begins by saying "I must make it absolutely clear that this is a very useful, and well-researched book, which deserves to find a place on the shelves of any reasonable conservation-oriented library", and compliments Fuller on "his comprehensiveness and detail." He found the illustrations to include "splendid examples" of work by Edward Lear, Joseph Wolf and J.G. Keulemans.

The Great Auk
The book of more than 450 pages is entirely devoted to the extinct great auk (Pinguinus impennis). It holds, apart from detailed descriptions of the history, ecology, habits and distribution of the "garefowl" (an old English name), a great many illustrations – often dating back to the 19th century –, details on 78 preserved specimen of the bird, worldwide, and 76 eggs.

Writing in The Guardian, Claire Armitstead commented that "Errol Fuller's magnificent self-published The Great Auk" was "one of the most astonishing books to cross my desk", and wrote that it was

"everything you wanted to know about an extinct bird. Besides all those beautiful 19th-century auk portraits, there are auk anecdotes, auk eggs... I'm not a great fan of bird books, but this irresistible folly captured a buccaneering spirit that sometimes seems as dead as the auk itself."

Dodo: From Extinction to Icon
Reviewing Dodo: From Extinction to Icon (2002), Stephen Moss, also in The Guardian, wrote that Fuller has

"assembled a fine defence of this much-maligned creature. In doing so he has produced a curious book, which although not up to the stature of his magnificent tome on the Great auk, is nevertheless fascinating."

The Passenger Pigeon
Reviewing Fuller's The Passenger Pigeon (2014) for The Guardian, the blogger GrrlScientist writes that the book's brief text provides a good introduction for people who know little about the bird, but that the book's primary purpose is "to provide a visual context for the history of passenger pigeons. Many of its pages are lavishly illustrated with rare photographs of the birds", while "Also included are some of the sketches and paintings, music and poetry that the pigeons inspired, as well as some items of historical interest."

Magazine articles

 * Fuller, Errol (April 1998). "Voyage of a Painter." Natural History (New York), pp. 12–14.