Fabre was born in Saint-Léons in Aveyron, France.
Fabre was largely an autodidact, owing to the poverty of his family. Nevertheless, he acquired a primary teaching certificate at the young age of 19 and began teaching at the college of Ajaccio, Corsica, called Carpentras. In 1852, he taught at the lycée in Avignon.
Fabre went on to accomplish many scholarly achievements. He was a popular teacher, physicist, chemist and botanist. However, he is probably best known for his findings in the field of entomology, the study of insects, and is considered by many to be the father of modern entomology. Much of his enduring popularity is due to his marvelous teaching ability and his manner of writing about the lives of insects in biographical form, which he preferred to a clinically detached, journalistic mode of recording. In doing so he combined what he called "my passion for scientific truth" with keen observations and an engaging, colloquial style of writing. Fabre noted:
Others again have reproached me with my style, which has not the solemnity, nay, better, the dryness of the schools. They fear lest a page that is read without fatigue should not always be the expression of the truth. Were I to take their word for it, we are profound only on condition of being obscure.
Over the years he wrote a series of texts on insects and arachnids that are collectively known as the Souvenirs Entomologiques. Fabre's influence is felt in the later works of fellow naturalistCharles Darwin, who called Fabre "an inimitable observer". Fabre, however, rejected Darwin's theory of evolution.
Fabre studied the habit of processionary caterpillars and in one experiment manipulated them to form a loop around a pot. Following their silken trail they moved around in a circle for seven days.
Jean-Henri Fabre's last home and office, the "Harmas de Sérignan" in Provence stands today as a museum devoted to his life and works.
The site of his birth, at St Léons, near Millau is now the site of Micropolis, a tourist attraction dedicated to popularising entomology and a museum on his life.
The Life of the Grasshopper. Dodd, Mead, and company, 1917. ASIN B00085HYR4
The Life of the Caterpillar. Dodd, Mead, 1919. ASIN B00089FB2A
Field, Forest, and Farm: Things interesting to young nature lovers, including some matters of moment to gardeners and fruit-growers. The Century Company, 1919. ASIN B00085PDU4
This Earth is Ours: Talks about Mountains and Rivers, Volcanoes, Earthquakes, and Geysers & Other Things. Albert & Charles Boni, 1923. ASIN B000EHLE22
The Glow-Worm and Other Beetles. Dodd, Mead, 1924. ASIN B000882F2K
Curiosities of Science. The Century Company, 1927. ASIN B00086KVBE
The Insect World of J. Henri Fabre. Introduction and Interpretive Comments by Edwin Way Teale; Foreword to 1991 edition by Gerald Durrell. Published by Dodd, Mead in 1949; Reprinted by Beacon Press in 1991; ISBN 0-8070-8513-8
The Life of the Spider (Translated) Preface by Maurice Maeterlinck; Introduction by John K. Terres. Published by Horizon Press, 1971; ISBN 0-8180-1705-8 (First published by Dodd, Mead, and company in 1913, ASIN B00085D6P8) Scanned book, Project Gutenberg Full Text
G.V. Legros, (Bernard Miall, translator), Fabre, Poet of Science. T. Fisher Unwin, 1913. (Reprinted by University Press of the Pacific, 2002, ISBN 0898759455; ISBN 978-0898759457) Scanned book
E.L. Bouvier, The Life and Work of J.H. Fabre. Annual Report of the Smithsonian Institution, 1916, pages 587-597.
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