Book Description
In 1858, Charles Darwin was forty-nine years old, a gentleman scientist living quietly at Down House in the Kent countryside. He was not yet a focus of debate; his "big book on species" still lay on his desk as a manuscript. For more than twenty years he had been accumulating material for it, puzzling over the questions that it raised, trying to bring it to a satisfactory conclusion, and wanting to be certain that his startling theory of evolution was correct.
It is at this point that the concluding volume of Janet Browne's magisterial biography opens. Beginning with the extraordinary events that finally forced the Origin of Species into print, we come to the years of fame and controversy. Here, Browne does dramatic justice to all aspects of the Darwinian revolution, from a fascinating examination of the Victorian publishing scene to a survey of the debates between scientists and churchmen over evolutionary theory. At the same time, she presents a wonderfully sympathetic and authoritative picture of Darwin himself.
Customer Reviews:
Sick and tired, but he carried on.......2007-01-30
This one is also great, get both of these wonderful books on Charles Darwin. The first one is slightly better than this one, as one expects from biographies. CD is settled down, mostly writing and promoting his beliefs. He is sick a lot, but carries on. There just got to be too much detail toward the end of this, for me. Otherwise the level of detail and tone was pitchperfect throughout. What an astounding, amazing effort these two books represent. A real gem.
Brilliant but flawed.......2006-03-10
This the second volume of Browne's Darwin biography has evoked high praise from a number of Amazon reviewers. It's praise well deserved. Her theme, the importance of Darwin's social position and his dedicated use of it to promote the uptake of his theories, makes a nice counterpoint to the path-breaking Desmond and Moore biography, whose theme was the `tormented evolutionist'. Not that Browne downplays the ghastly burden of Darwin's invalidity on his person and family: torment it assuredly was. Yet he persisted in his labors, which included extensive involvement with many helpers, and somehow managed to bring it all to fruition. What were the emotional springs of that endurance? Dedication to the glory of the Nation, or to Science, or to Mankind? No, the poetry of ideals is missing. Exaltation in his ever-increasing celebrity? Again No. While Darwin kept a detailed record of every review of the Origin and other publications, and took measures to promote them, fame was not his defining horizon. If it were, he probably would not have anguished, as he did, about the expected heat entropy termination of life on Earth some millions of years hence. Consistent with that gloom, his final publication was on worms, whose habitat, he well understood, he would soon join. Browne writes: `He was in the grip of a vision of time as powerful and as bleak as anything in Victorian culture'. The source of his endurance seems to have been his immersion in the routine of Downe House. The routine included his dependency on wife Emma and the kids, especially Henrietta and Francis. He kept a detailed account of household expenses and, in pinchpenny manner, insisted on avoidance of extravagance despite his wealth, which he more than doubled thanks to astute investments. Although he could have easily created a state-of-the-art research station at Downe, he persisted (against Francis' appeals) in the use of crude and meager equipment, much to the amazement of scientists who visited him. Yet greatness somehow arose from just this obsessive immersion in routine that stretched over four decades. Browne notes that his devoted friend Joseph Hooker exclaimed on receiving a photographic portrait that he `looked like Moses'. Sons William and Francis agreed. So have millions who've seen the expression of deep thoughtfulness in the numerous portraits of the frail, aging Darwin.
What was his illness? His death certificate specified angina pectoris syncope as the cause. Today an autopsy would probably confirm cardiac arrest. He had experienced heart pains periodically for years, although several physicians found no symptoms of heart disease. I was surprised that in her illuminating discussion of his illnesses Browne doesn't notice that Darwin's fatigue, which greatly reduced his mobility for about two decades, is consistent with heart failure. When we add the information that Darwin was a long-time smoker, confidence in that diagnosis increases. And the retching and flatulence? Browne mentions the proposal that these symptoms could be effects of Chagas disease, caused by the parasite Trypanosoma cruzi, which he might have contracted in Chile. Retching, skin rashes, and heart disease are symptoms of the disease in its chronic phase. This is an attractive diagnosis, since it achieves concordance of clinical signs from two causal pathways. Browne puts it aside because, it seems, she suspects an interaction between Darwin's stressed emotional life, his peculiar withdrawal into the Downe House refuge, and physical symptoms (pp. 235ff). Alas, she seems unacquainted with contemporary psychiatry, which would easily read her symptom list as indicative of the Avoidant Personality Disorder (`Grief and guilt surely played their part in his psyche. Fear, too, especially in the way his body would most often fail when he intended make a public appearance, suggesting some deep-seated dread of exposure. His customary reticence may have reflected a wish to avoid getting involved with other people's emotions-reticence and modesty could have been the polite face of dissociation, the spurning of closeness' p. 237). APD would link Darwin's strong avoidance pattern with his equally strong striving for approval, and pain on the occasion of disapproval of friends and strangers. It also incorporates his many self-deprecations and his anticipations, even from friends, that they might respond to a thought of his with extreme disapproval, eg, `crucifixion'.
I turn briefly to Browne's rendition of the Huxley-Wilberforce debate at the June 1860 BAAS meeting in Oxford. The debate is a paramount icon in the Darwin legend and a `defining moment in Victorian history' (p 115). The confrontation occurred on the last day of a conference that had been dominated by public and academic excitement about the Origin of Species. A large audience turned out expecting to hear Bishop Wilberforce `smash' Darwin's theory. They were not disappointed, for the Bishop, who was Bishop of Oxford and hence on home ground, did indeed criticize the theory on a number of points. The presiding officer, Darwin's former teacher Rev Henslow, called on Huxley to speak. He defended the logic and evidence of Darwin's theory, and finished with the damning declaration that if he had to choose between accepting an ape as his grandfather and a high dignitary who obfuscated science to defend prejudice, then he would prefer the ape grandfather. The Darwin legend interprets Huxley's retort as a one-line `proof' of the superiority of science to theology which also shifted the mixed feelings of the audience into emphatic support for Huxley and science. But did it happen? Did Wilberforce taunt Huxley about his ancestry and did Huxley respond as claimed? Did the audience convulse in laughter at the Bishop and treat Huxley as a hero, as he boasted? Doubts arise because the first report of this incident was an aside in a 1898 article, `A Grandmother's Tale', in Macmillan's Magazine-38 years after the event! The critical literature on this event has pretty well reduced it to wishful thinking of Darwin partisans, beginning with Huxley's imaginary self-congratulatory victory. Even if the facts were as claimed in The Grandmother's Tale, they would have no bearing on the substance of Wilberforce's criticisms, which he detailed in a lengthy review of Origin. As for Huxley, he had publicly expressed doubts about the compatibility of Darwin's theory with the long periods of stasis in the fossil record; and he never accepted natural selection as the main mechanism of evolution. Browne's narrative of this iconically central issue is unsatisfactory. She does not advise readers that serious criticism of the story has been made and her narrative incorporates Huxley's tale as fact. Yet she knows that the celebrated triumph is imaginary. Solution? `The gossip running through the crowd afterwards quickly crafted an epic narrative, a collective fiction with an inbuilt meaning much more tangible and important than reality. All felt they were witnessing history in the making' (pp. 124f). There you have creative history: gossip frankly declared to be better than reality. Smacks of postmodernism.
Truth Prevails.......2005-09-23
Darwin's tightly held theories on natural selection are let loose to a resistant public but a public that was also proud of their intellectuals. Darwin's network of scientific friends and associates provide strength to a highly disruptive theory and in so advance their own scientific careers.
An effortless and endlessly satisfying read.......2005-09-12
Along with the rest of the well-deserved high praise that comes to Janet Browne's biography of Charles Darwin I would add, with others, that its most extraordinary aspect is its readability. Biographies are almost always irritating in some way or another--Browne's volumes are effortless in any genre, miraculous in the difficult work of biography. It's quite true that both _Voyaging_ and _Power of Place_ are books you can't put down; they are so absorbing that you instantly forget you are reading. I find myself recommending them to people with no interest whatsoever in the subject simply for the reading pleasure. For scholars of the historical subject, the volumes provide a unified and inspiring reference. Browne's is a tremendous gift to Darwin's legacy and to the reception of his work.
Darwin the power of place by Janet Browne.......2005-05-26
This is one of the best biography books that I have ever read. It is factual and beautifully written
Average customer rating:
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Becoming Darwin.(Book Review): An article from: New Criterion
Paul R. Gross
Manufacturer: Foundation for Cultural Review
ProductGroup: Book
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ASIN: B0008G6BUO
Release Date: 2005-07-30 |
Book Description
This digital document is an article from New Criterion, published by Foundation for Cultural Review on February 1, 2003. The length of the article is 2599 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.
Citation Details
Title: Becoming Darwin.(Book Review)
Author: Paul R. Gross
Publication:
New Criterion (Magazine/Journal)
Date: February 1, 2003
Publisher: Foundation for Cultural Review
Volume: 21
Issue: 6
Page: 71(6)
Article Type: Book Review
Distributed by Thomson Gale
Book Description
Fourteen-year-old Trisha Driscoll is a gender-blurring, self-described loner whose family expects nothing of her. While her mother lies on the couch in a hypochondriac haze and her sister aspires to be on The Real World, Trisha struggles to find her own place among the neon signs, theme restaurants, and cookie-cutter chain stores of her hometown.
After being hired and abruptly fired from the most popular clothing shop at the local mall, Trisha befriends a chain-smoking misfit named Rose, and her life shifts into manic overdrive. A “postmillennial, class-adjusted My So-Called Life” (Publishers Weekly), Rose of No Man’s Land is brimming with snarky observations and soulful musings on contemporary teenage America.
Customer Reviews:
A Teenage Lesbian Romance.......2007-05-21
This young adult novel lacks the all-tied-up ending, much like real life. You'll love watching the teenage lesbian relationship evolve.
"After high school comes life. Don't ask me what I'm supposed to do with it.".......2007-04-29
Tea is spot-on at getting inside the head and life of fourteen-year-old Trisha, aimless, frustrated, and rather trashy resident of a decaying Massachusetts mill town. Her hypochondriac mother never leaves the sofa except to dig her welfare checks out of the mail, her relentlessly optimistic older sister is a graduated hairdresser whose goal is being selected by a reality TV show, and her view of the world is filtered through the local mall -- where, with the assistance of her sister's Olympics-level lies, she manages to get a job at the most popular teen clothing store. Until she's fired before lunch the first day. But all this is a character-establishing lead-in to Trisha's discovery of Rose, a scrawny, fearless, adventuresome girl with a lesbian mother and a cigarette voice. The relationship between the two -- established within hours of their introduction and apparently played out before the next morning -- will have evangelical parents screaming to their local library about the "homosexual agenda," but, hey: This is life. The author also has an ear for sardonic description (a vodka/energy drink combo?) and an eye for painting character portraits that come to life. Don't worry about the putative morality these girls don't much subscribe to -- just enjoy the book. It's a messy, questing coming-of-age you won't soon forget.
Rose of No Man's Land.......2007-03-28
This was an excellent novel! Very unique writing style and point of view.
Why, Michelle Tea, why? .......2007-01-08
This book made me want to stab my eyes out. I read Valencia a few weeks ago, and was hoping for more of the fabulously insightful and beautiful descriptions ("Iris went through girls like a slash and burn farmer." How cool can you get?) that made it a good book. The drama of all of the sex and drugs and love was certainly exciting, but left alone, it would have been somewhat pointless. This is precisely why I do not understand why Michelle Tea would abandon her poet's voice to become a fourteen-year-old girl.
As a piece of YA fiction, this book is perhaps somewhat better than the rest because it's different. It's not neat and tidy (because since when is reality?), and it doesn't perpetuate all the gender roles and heterosexist crap that so thickly pervade teen pop culture. It's nice to hear from someone other than a straight, feminine middle-class white girl for once.
PS: I don't even believe the person who wrote the official Booklist review even read the book (or Valencia, for that matter). Some of those statements about the plot are flat-out wrong. But now I'm just being picky.
Nice Read.......2007-01-02
So I wasn't planning to read another Michelle Tea book after Valencia, but it was a Christmas gift and I read this in about three days. I liked it, but it was kind of awkward. The word "wicked" as in "very" is thrown around way too much, which is kind of annoying, and Michelle Tea did this thing that I don't really understand if it was supposed to be some kind of irony or what, but she described all these stores in the story, without using their real names. Hot Topic became Dark Subject or something like that, and Jack in the Box became Clown in a Box. It was just kind of weird. It was a fun read though, right up to the amusing, repeated use of the name of the store where the main character got a job for an afternoon, called Ohmigod! The whole story takes place over a couple days, mostly one, though, where Trisha (main x-ter) meets this weird little freak named Rose and they have a bit of an adventure with crystal meth and booze and all female make out sessions. It's discovery for Trisha and entertainment for the reader, but at the end of the book, I'm kind of like "Ohmigod! What was that? Is there a point to this story? Does there need to be? What's the deal?" Like I said, I had fun reading it, but just like Valencia, I have mixed feelings about it and its worthiness. I just wonder, if Michelle Tea weren't sort of famous in this particular region of the literary world, would this story have even gotten published? I don't want to be the nitpicky bitch about her writing, but I couldn't help but be totally distracted by some of the typos and spelling errors that were just really bad and "wicked" obvious. Who edited this thing? With all due respect, I kind of wished I had borrowed it from the library, since there's only so much room on my bookcase. I do like Michelle as a writer and enjoyed this story, but I think she could have put more thought into this book and the details I mentioned.
Book Description
This book is a unique and substantive tribute to Ronald Reagan, one of the most important figures in U.S. and world history. It includes Reagan's most trenchant speeches as President ("Evil Empire," "Tear down this Wall," remarks commemorating the fortieth anniversary of the Normandy Invasion, his farewell to the nation on leaving the Presidency); essential speeches delivered before holding the Office of President ("Rendezvous with Destiny"); all-but-impossible-to-find policy articles written by Reagan for National Review; and words of praise - old as well as new following Reagan's death - from William F. Buckley Jr., Margaret Thatcher, Robert Bork, Paul Johnson, Edwin Meese III, Tom Wolfe, and others.
Book Description
In this book Jan Albers examines the history--natural, environmental, social, and ultimately human--of one of America's most cherished landscapes: Vermont.
Albers shows how Vermont has come to stand for the ideal of unspoiled rural community, examining both the basis of the state's pastoral image and the equally real toll taken by the pressure of human hands on the land. She begins with the relatively light touch of Vermont's Native Americans, then shows how European settlers--armed with a conviction that their claim to the land was "a God-given right"--shaped the landscape both to meet economic needs and to satisfy philosophical beliefs. The often turbulent result: a conflict between practical requirements and romantic ideals that has persisted to this day.
Making lively use of contemporary accounts, advertisements, maps, landscape paintings, and vintage photographs, Albers delves into the stories and personalities behind the development of a succession of Vermont landscapes. She observes the growth of communities from tiny settlements to picturesque villages to bustling cities; traces the development of agriculture, forestry, mining, industry, and the influence of burgeoning technology; and proceeds to the growth of environmental consciousness, aided by both private initiative and governmental regulation. She reveals how as community strengthens, so does responsible stewardship of the land.
Albers shows that like any landscape, the Vermont landscape reflects the human decisions that have been made about it--and that the more a community understands about how such decisions have been made, the better will be its future decisions.
Customer Reviews:
Interesting choice of topic.......2007-02-14
As an English Professor, I often try to root out the "story behind the story". Jan Albers holds a PhD from Yale, but fails to mention a background in newspaper journalism. How does one detect such a hidden past? By her consistent omission of the Oxford, or "serial" comma in her writing.
Newspaper writers often omit the final comma preceding the "and" in a series of items in a sentence to save precious column inches, thus:
"Joe had eggs, bacon and toast for breakfast."
Whereas the rest of the literary world generally includes commas to separate three or more words, phrases, or clauses written in a series, thus:
"Joe had eggs, bacon, and toast for breakfast."
Thus, I can but conclude the author's style was strongly influenced by a background in newspaper journalism.
Excellent book, just the same. History has long ignored the stage upon which the play was set.
Great Book.......2007-01-09
This is a fantastic book for those who love Vermont and the history of the land and environment. It's informative - has great photos and is just a joy to pick up at any time to take a browse. I highly recommened it.
Important, topical and beautiful........2004-06-24
Rarely has a volume of such physical grace and beauty contained such an important and topical message. I picked up my copy after returning to Vermont for a long weekend, and found the text both forceful, dynamic and informative, artistically combined with beautiful illustrations. Not a hagiography, and avoiding the temptation to airbrush the realities of Vermont into a pastiche of the country idyll in Yankee New England, Jan Albers has created an immensely readable but intellectually rigorous study of the development and land-use choices that Vermonters have made since the Abenaki were disturbed by white settlers.
This alone would be enough to qualify "Hands on the Land" for a place on the bookshelves of students of land-use and concerned citizens in rural and semi-rural areas everywhere. For a UK audience, the impact of sheep farming vs. cattle grazing (which denuded the forests of Vermont in the manner of the North York moors in the later 19th Century) only adds interest. That this study is so accessible and lavishly illustrated, (much in the style of the latest offerings from the OUP History of England series) commends it to the broadest possible audience. In fact, I was so taken with this that I bought two - one for my mother, a native and transplanted Vermonter, and one for me - your bookshelf will be a richer and happier place with a copy!
Glad I Read This.......2004-01-06
This remarkable book is essentially a history of Vermont told from the perspective of the relationship between human beings and the physical environment, i.e. how succeeding generations have tried to make a living out of a surprisingly inhospitable bit of territory. This provides useful lessons, as other reviewers note, on public policy and land use, but for me it was more interesting as a uniquely revealing approach to social and economic history. Among other revelations, the book highlights the fact that the popular image of Vermont as a throwback to an idyllic yesteryear is a recent creation promulgated to fuel the state's latest and arguably most successful land use ever -- tourism. The reality has been rather different. The book is easy to read, with pictures and graphics that contribute to the knowledge being conveyed. The overall conception would be worthy of emulation by historians and planners addressing other regions or periods.
Nice Text book.......2001-11-02
If a person is looking for a text book this is a great one. It has a lot on photos, graphics and stories. But it is for reading at a desk, not on a plane.
I like it. Now I'm going to be a Vermont Historian
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