Last Chance to See

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Last Chance to See
The front cover of the first US hardcover edition.
Author	Douglas Adams and Mark Carwardine
Publisher	Pan Books
Publication date	1990
ISBN	9780345371980
OCLC Number	26948233

Last Chance to See is a book written by Douglas Adams and Mark Carwardine first published in 1990, as a companion to the BBC radio series of the same name. The theme of documentary was to feature animal species which were endangered or threatened with extinction. A BBC television remake of the series, with Stephen Fry replacing the late Adams is airing in 2009.^[1]

[edit] Magazine, radio, book, CD ROM

The Observer Colour Magazine initiated moves in 1985 to send a zoologist, Mark Carwardine, and a writer, Douglas Adams, to Madagascar, to search for a nearly extinct lemur.

Later this developed into several journeys to find various species, including:

• Komodo dragon on the island of Komodo in Indonesia;
• Kakapos in New Zealand;
• Aye-aye in Madagascar;
• Gorillas in Zaire;
• White Rhinoceroses in Zaire;
• Yangtze River Dolphin in China;
• Rodrigues fruit bats (megabat) on the island of Rodrigues; and
• Juan Fernandez Fur Seal.

Many of these excursions became the basis for the BBC Radio 4 series of the same name.

Many of the excursions were written into the companion book, though not all, allegedly due to Adams' notorious writing delays. An example is that of the Amazonian Manatee, covered in a radio episode first transmitted on 18 October 1989, but not in the subsequent book.

The first American hardcover edition was published by Harmony Books in 1991 (under ISBN 0-517-58215-5) and the first German paperback edition was published in 1992 by Heyne (under ISBN 3-453-06115-2). These varying editions are notable for carrying slightly different photographs of the journeys. An abridged audiobook read by Adams was also published.

Later editions of the book had two lines of a humorous exchange deleted from the end of the interview with Doctor Struan Sutherland, an Australian venomous-reptiles expert, in the chapter on their trip to Indonesia to see the Komodo dragon ("Here Be Chickens"). The reason for the deletion is unknown. Earlier editions had the exchange ending with Adams asking the expert whether there were any venomous creatures he liked, and the expert replying, "There was, but she left me."

In the biography and essay collection published after his death, The Salmon of Doubt, Adams describes Last Chance to See as his favorite work.

[edit] CD ROM

The Voyager Company also published a 2 CD-ROM set (for Microsoft Windows 3.1 and Macintosh System 7), in 1992, featuring over 800 still photographs, Adams reading the nearly complete book, Carwardine reading fact files on the species they searched like side bars, and extracts from the BBC Radio 4 series.

[edit] Television series 2009

In April 2007 a follow-up television series, also called Last Chance to See, (Directed by Tim Green) with Stephen Fry joining Mark Carwardine as presenters, was announced as a BBC / Iostar co-production. Although the Iostar TV company has since gone into liquidation, Carwardine announced in July 2007 that the project is still going ahead. The first filming for the series, which is now a co-production between BBC Wales and West Park Pictures took place in the Amazon and Florida in December 2007.^[3] In January 2008, Fry broke his right arm whilst filming in Brazil for the programme.^[4]

The TV serial drops the Fruit Bat, Yangtze River Dolphin ("in all probability extinct"), Juan Fernandez Fur Seal ("current population of about 10,000 animals") and seeks out instead:^[5]

• Amazonian Manatee
• Northern White Rhinoceros
• Aye-Aye
• Komodo dragon
• Kakapo
• Blue Whale

Filming continued on the BBC's Last Chance to See series in October 2008 and Stephen Fry and Mark Carwardine travelled to remote areas all over the world from October 2008 until April 2009 in a search for endangered species - some of which featured in the original series and some of which did not. The BBC has launched a website which shows their adventures and also contains the original radio series. Filming is now complete and the series begins on BBC2 on September 6 at 8pm. It will also be released as a DVD by Digital Classics DVD and Mark Carwardine has completed a new book documenting the new adventures.

The front cover of the CD-ROM box set edition of Last Chance to See for computers running Windows 3.1 or later.

[edit] References

[edit] Further reading

• Book extracts:
  • "BBC Last Chance to See - About - Brazil extract". http://www.bbc.co.uk/lastchancetosee/sites/about/book_chapter01.shtml. Retrieved 2009-06-04. 
  • "BBC Last Chance to See - About - Madagascar extract". http://www.bbc.co.uk/lastchancetosee/sites/about/book_chapter03.shtml. Retrieved 2009-06-04. 
  • "BBC Last Chance to See - About - New Zealand extract". http://www.bbc.co.uk/lastchancetosee/sites/about/book_chapter04.shtml. Retrieved 2009-06-04. 

• Adams, D., Carwardine, M., Last Chance to See (Windows CD-ROM set), ISBN 1-55940-427-2 The Voyager Company, New York, 1992.
• Gaiman, N., Don't Panic - Douglas Adams & the Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy, ISBN 1-84023-742-2 Titan Books, London, 1993

• "BBC - h2g2 - Last Chance To See - the Radio Series and Book". http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A3784845. Retrieved 2009-06-04. 

[edit] External links

• Last Chance to See - BBC Page
• DVD Available From - Digital Classics DVD