From the author of Leviathan, or, The Whale, comes a composite portrait of the subtle, beautiful, inspired and demented ways in which we have come to terms with our watery planet.

Philip Hoare is the author of several books, including 'Serious Pleasures: The Life of Stephen Tennant'; 'Noel Coward'; 'Oscar Wilde's Last Stand'; 'Spike Island'; 'England's Lost Eden'; 'Leviathan, or, The Whale', winner of the 2009 Samuel Johnson Prize for non-fiction; and 'The Sea Inside'. He lives in Southampton.