Insectopolis: A Natural History

by Peter Kuper

Overview

Award-winning cartoonist Peter Kuper transports readers through the 400-million-year history of insects and the remarkable entomologists who have studied them.

This visually immersive work of graphic nonfiction dives into a world where ants, cicadas, bees, and butterflies visit a library exhibition that displays their stories and humanity’s connection to them throughout the ages. Kuper’s thrilling visual feast layers history and science, color and design, to tell the remarkable tales of dung beetles navigating by the stars, hawk-size prehistoric dragonflies hunting prey, and mosquitoes changing the course of human history.

Kuper also illuminates pioneering naturalists, from well-known figures like E. O. Wilson and Rachel Carson to unheralded luminaries like Charles Henry Turner, the Black American scholar who documented arthropod intelligence, and Maria Sybilla Merian, the seventeenth-century German regarded as the mother of entomology.

Galvanized by the sixth extinction and the ongoing insect crisis, Kuper takes readers on an unforgettable journey.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781324035718
Publisher:	Norton, W. W. & Company, Inc.
Publication date:	05/13/2025
Pages:	256
Product dimensions:	8.90(w) x 10.60(h) x 1.20(d)

About the Author

Peter Kuper wrote the Eisner Award–winning Ruins and critically acclaimed adaptations of Alice in Wonderland, Heart of Darkness, and Metamorphosis. He founded the political anthology World War 3 Illustrated, writes and draws Mad magazine’s Spy vs. Spy, and taught Harvard University’s first class dedicated to graphic novels and comics.

 

Editorial Reviews

"If insects weren’t everywhere on Earth, you and I wouldn’t be here either (on Earth). What about the other way round? What if we weren’t here, but insects were, and these insects could read? In a library? It would be Insectopolis. That’s a future Peter Kuper imagines and illustrates for us in exquisite detail. Take all the time you need. There are millions of years to review and quintillions of these creatures to consider."

Bill Nye

"Even if you’re not a giant fan of insects, you’ll have more respect for them, if not actual love, by reading Insectopolis. A fascinating and breathtakingly beautiful book."

Roz Chast

"Insectopolis is wildly inventive and, at the same time, deeply informative. Every page is full of surprises."

Elizabeth Kolbert

"It’s generous of the insects to share their planet with us, and that’s never been more powerfully (and charmingly) illustrated than by Peter Kuper. This book will reorient your understanding of humanity’s place on earth."

Bill McKibben

"Peter Kuper’s stunning Insectopolis takes readers on a journey, traveling through time and space in the company of Earth’s most underappreciated beings. Each page is lush with closely observed detail: the iridescence of a beetle’s exoskeleton, the velvety wing of a moth, the shadow cast by a single ant. Visually dazzling and rich with information, it is a book that will change the way you see the world and the trillions of tiny creatures scuttling and buzzing all around us."

Lauren Redniss

"Peter Kuper’s Insectopolis is a visually stunning tribute to the world of bugs, revealing their profound impact on both nature and human history. I may not love insects yet, but after reading this, I’m definitely in awe of them."

Gene Luen Yang

"Stunningly beautiful and hugely informative, Insectopolis is a perfect example of the importance of merging the sciences and arts. What an achievement!"

Andrea Wulf

"Insectopolis will forever change the way you look at bugs. Peter Kuper masterfully intertwines natural and social history to show how insects shaped the evolution of all life on Earth and, also, how they have helped change the course of civilization throughout millennia. With heart, wit, erudition, and a boundless sense of beauty, Kuper reveals the wonders of the often-neglected realm of arthropods while poignantly reminding us that we, humans, are but fleeting visitors in it."

Hernan Diaz

"Scientific facts are blended with cultural and historical vignettes in this beautiful book, a soon-to-be-treasured staple on the shelf of any insect lover."

Dr. Jessica L. Ware

"Peter Kuper’s Insectopolis is a visually stunning tribute to the world of bugs, revealing their profound impact on both nature and human history. I may not love insects yet, but after reading this, I’m definitely in awe of them."

From the Publisher