Discovering the Wisdom of the Forest: Suzanne Simard

Author and scientist Suzanne Simard is a Professor of Forest Ecology at the University of British Columbia and the author of the book Finding the Mother Tree (Knopf, 2021). Her TED talks have been viewed by more than 10 million people worldwide. Suzanne is known for her work on how trees interact and communicate using below-ground fungal networks, which has led to the recognition that forests have hub trees, or Mother Trees, which are large, highly connected trees that play an important role in the flow of information and resources in a forest. Suzanne has published over 200 peer-reviewed articles and presented at conferences around the world.

Victoria Wilson is Vice president and Executive Editor at Alfred Knopf. Among the many authors she has published include Walter Abish, Alice Adams, Diane Ravitch, Laurel Ulrich, Susan Cheever, Amy Klobuchar, Laurie Colwin, Diane Johnson, William Gass, Mary Dearborn, Peter Bogdanovich, Lorrie Moore, Anne Rice, Arthur Laurents, Frank Maresca, Sarah Chayes, Philippe Sands, Jill Ciment, Christopher Plummer, Lisa Alther, Meryle Secrest, Ruth Gruber, Jane Alexander, Jacques d’Amboise, and Erin Brocovitch. WIlson is the author of Volume One of A Life of Barbara Stanwyck and is at work on the concluding volume. She grew up on Martha’s Vineyard and lives in New York City and upstate New York.