Editing Last Chance to See

{{Short description|BBC radio documentary series}}
{{EngvarB|date=September 2013}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=August 2024}}
{{About|the radio documentary series|the follow-up television series|Last Chance to See (TV series)}}
{{Infobox book
| name          = Last Chance to See
| title_orig    =
| translator    =
| image         = Last Chance to See Harmony front.jpg
| caption       = The front cover of the first US hardcover edition.
| author        = [[Douglas Adams]] and [[Mark Carwardine]]
| illustrator   =
| cover_artist  =
| country       =
| language      =
| series        =
| subject       =
| genre         =
| publisher     = [[Pan Books]]
| pub_date      = 1990
| pages         =
| isbn          = 978-0-345-37198-0
| oclc= 26948233
| preceded_by   =
| followed_by   =
}}

'''''Last Chance to See''''' is a 1989 [[BBC]] radio documentary series and its accompanying book, written and presented by [[Douglas Adams]] and [[Mark Carwardine]]. In the series, Adams and Carwardine travel to various locations in the hope of encountering [[species]] on the brink of [[extinction]]. The book was published in 1990.

In 2009, the [[BBC]] broadcast a [[Last Chance to See (TV series)|television follow-up series of the same name]], with [[Stephen Fry]] replacing the late Adams.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/lastchancetosee/|title=BBC ''Last Chance to See'' – Home – Last Chance to See|access-date=4 June 2009}}</ref>

In 1985, Douglas Adams went to [[Madagascar]] in search of the (possibly extinct) lemur the [[aye-aye]]. The trip was part of a project by the [[World Wide Fund for Nature]] and British Sunday newspaper ''[[The Observer]]'', sending well-known authors to remote places to seek endangered species and write articles for ''The Observer Magazine'', to help raise awareness of ecological issues.  Adams was met in Madagascar by zoologist Mark Carwardine (who was working for the WWF at the time). The ''Observer'' project was successful, and Adams and Carwardine developed a radio series around the same concept for [[BBC Radio 4]]. Carwardine later said:

: "We put a big map of the world on a wall, Douglas stuck a pin in everywhere he fancied going, I stuck a pin in where all the endangered animals were, and we made a journey out of every place that had two pins."<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/lastchancetosee/sites/about/last_chance_to_see.shtml|title=BBC ''Last Chance to See'' – About – Background|access-date=4 June 2009}}</ref>

The journeys undertaken were to see:
* The [[aye-aye]] in Madagascar
* The [[Komodo dragon]] on the island of [[Komodo (island)|Komodo]] in Indonesia
* The [[kākāpō]] in New Zealand
* The [[mountain gorilla]] in [[Zaire]]
* The [[northern white rhinoceros]] in Zaire
* The [[baiji|Yangtze river dolphin]] in China
* The [[Rodrigues flying fox|Rodrigues fruit bat]] on the island of [[Rodrigues (island)|Rodrigues]], [[Mauritius]]
* The [[Amazonian manatee]] in Brazil
* The [[Juan Fernández fur seal]] on the [[Juan Fernández Islands]], Chile

==Radio==
{{Infobox Radio Show
| show_name          = Last Chance to See
| format             = Wildlife documentary
| runtime            =
| country            = United Kingdom
| language           = English
| home_station       = [[BBC Radio 4]]
| starring           = [[Douglas Adams]] and [[Mark Carwardine]]
| first_aired        = October 1989
| last_aired         = November 1989
| website            = [https://www.bbc.co.uk/lastchancetosee/sites/radio/ BBC Radio]
}}
The aye-aye programme was broadcast on BBC Radio 4 on 1 November 1985 as a pilot;<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/lastchancetosee/sites/radio/aye_aye.shtml|title=BBC - Last Chance to See - Radio - Natural Selection: In Search of the Aye-aye|access-date=1 November 2013}}</ref> six further episodes were then broadcast in 1989:
* The [[kākāpō]] - 4 October<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/lastchancetosee/sites/radio/kakapo.shtml|title=BBC - Last Chance to See - Radio - Search for the {{As written|kakapo}}|access-date=1 November 2013}}</ref>
* The [[Yangtze river dolphin]] - 11 October<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/lastchancetosee/sites/radio/river_dolphin.shtml|title=BBC - Last Chance to See - Radio - Search for the Yangtze river dolphin|access-date=1 November 2013}}</ref>
* The [[Amazonian manatee]] - 18 October<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/lastchancetosee/sites/radio/manatee.shtml|title=BBC - Last Chance to See - Radio - Search for the manatee|access-date=1 November 2013}}</ref>
* The [[Rodrigues fruit bat]] - 25 October<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/lastchancetosee/sites/radio/fruit_bat.shtml|title=BBC - Last Chance to See - Radio - Search for the Rodrigues fruit bat|access-date=1 November 2013}}</ref>
* The [[Komodo dragon]] - 1 November<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/lastchancetosee/sites/radio/komodo_dragon.shtml|title=BBC - Last Chance to See - Radio - Search for the Komodo dragon|access-date=1 November 2013}}</ref>
* The [[Juan Fernández fur seal]] - 8 November<ref>{{cite web|url=http://h2g2.com/edited_entry/A3784845|title=h2g2 - Last Chance To See - the Radio Series and Book|date=April 2005 |access-date=1 November 2013}}</ref>

The [[mountain gorilla]] and [[northern white rhino]], although the subject of chapters in the book, did not appear in the radio series.

==Book==
In 1990, an accompanying book was published in the UK, describing the various adventures that duo had encountered on journeys, often with a comic tone. The book covers most of the radio episodes, but excludes the Juan Fernández fur seal and the Amazonia manatee.  It includes some colour photographs taken by Carwardine.

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 editions carry slightly different photographs of the journeys.  An abridged audiobook, read by Adams, was also published.

In the posthumous biography and essay collection, ''[[The Salmon of Doubt]]'', Adams describes ''Last Chance to See'' as his favourite work.

==CD-ROM==
[[File:Last Chance to See Voyager front.jpg|thumb|200px|The front cover of the CD-ROM box set edition of ''Last Chance to See'' for computers running Windows 3.1 or later.]]

[[The Voyager Company]] also published a two CD-ROM set (for Microsoft [[Windows 3.1x|Windows 3.1]] and [[System 6|Macintosh System 6]]), 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.

==Television series==
{{Main|Last Chance to See (TV series)}}
In 2009, the BBC broadcast a television follow-up series, in which [[Stephen Fry]], a friend of the late Adams, accompanies Carwardine on a journey to see what has changed in the 20 years since the radio broadcasts. The series excludes the Rodrigues fruit bat, the Yangtze river dolphin, which is "in all probability extinct", and the Juan Fernandez fur seal, which had proved embarrassingly easy for Adams and Carwardine to find.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/lastchancetosee/sites/about/news_sept2008.shtml|title=BBC ''Last Chance to See'' – About – September 2008|access-date=4 June 2009}}</ref>

==References==
{{Reflist|2}}

==Further reading==
* Book extracts:
** {{cite web|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/lastchancetosee/sites/about/book_chapter01.shtml|title=BBC ''Last Chance to See'' – About – Brazil extract|access-date=4 June 2009}}
** {{cite web|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/lastchancetosee/sites/about/book_chapter03.shtml|title=BBC ''Last Chance to See'' – About – Madagascar extract|access-date=4 June 2009}}
** {{cite web|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/lastchancetosee/sites/about/book_chapter04.shtml|title=BBC ''Last Chance to See'' – About – New Zealand extract|access-date=4 June 2009}}
* [[Douglas Adams|Adams, D.]], [[Mark Carwardine|Carwardine, M.]], ''Last Chance to See'' (Windows CD-ROM set), {{ISBN|1-55940-427-2}} The Voyager Company, New York, 1992.
* [[Neil Gaiman|Gaiman, N.]], ''Don't Panic – Douglas Adams & the Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy'', {{ISBN|1-84023-742-2}} Titan Books, London, 1993
* {{cite web|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A3784845|title=BBC – h2g2 – ''Last Chance To See'' – the Radio Series and Book|access-date=4 June 2009}}

==External links==
{{wikiquote}}
* [https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00vxzcj ''Last Chance to See'' - BBC programme guide]
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ZG8HBuDjgc Douglas Adams: Parrots the Universe and Everything – Douglas Adams gives a talk centered around the book ''Last Chance to See'']

{{Douglas Adams}}
{{Auth}}

[[Category:1990 non-fiction books]]
[[Category:1990 in the environment]]
[[Category:Environmental non-fiction books]]
[[Category:Collaborative non-fiction books]]
[[Category:Books by Douglas Adams]]
[[Category:British documentary radio programmes]]
[[Category:Documentary films about nature]]
[[Category:Pan Books books]]