To Know a Fly
written by Vincent G. Dethier
illustrated by Bill Clark and Vincent Dethier
Forward by N. Tinbergen
(1962)

This is a side-splittingly funny nonfiction book about the study of flies.

Take a moment to consider that, and now give me the benefit of the doubt for a few paragraphs to prove how this seemingly impossibility is not only possible but true.

Consider being in a laboratory setting. There are serious educated men (this being the 1960s, they were all men except for the cleaning lady), mysterious lab equipment, official white lab coats, a sterile environment, and, of course, the lab animals…who are all flies. Now consider those serious educated men attempting to coral those flies (not easy), keep that environment sterile (virtually impossible), and perform little experiments with them (a bit of a hit-or-miss proposition). This is the story told by Vincent Gaston Dethier, a leading American entomologist, i.e. a scientist who studies bugs. He writes in the same manner that I image he spoke at dinner parties, about the amusing and amazing things that had happened that day, intended for an audience made up of whoever his neighbors happened to be.

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