Janet Browne鈥檚 award-winning, two-volume biography of Charles Darwin has been described by many reviewers as the definitive biography of the father of evolution. Now, Browne has skillfully distilled and fully revised the work into a concise yet comprehensive one-volume biography that offers significant new interpretations of Darwin and the scientific and political legacy of his discoveries.
Few men shook the Victorian world like Darwin did, and his story is in many ways that of the nineteenth century. His theory of evolution was born in the age of empire and had its greatest effect in the age of capitalism. It was to change the course of science, culture, and history, and deeply influence literature, art, philosophy, religion, politics, and economics. This magisterial biography follows Darwin from his early life and adventures on HMS Beagle to the tumult of becoming one of the first scientific celebrities with the publication of the Origin of Species. Through personal letters and archives, Browne describes the processes that brought the idea of evolution by natural selection into British society and beyond, especially Darwin鈥檚 relationship with Alfred Russel Wallace, who simultaneously proposed the same theory, and with the many people who helped and supported Darwin, including his wife Emma Wedgwood. Combining the best elements of social and intellectual biography, Browne places Darwin in cultural context and integrates his ideas with his private life.
Vivid, revealing, and compellingly readable, Darwin is the indispensable biography of a gentleman naturalist who would become one of the most important, influential, and controversial scientists of all time.
Janet Browne, one of the world’s leading experts on Charles Darwin, is the Aramont Professor Emerita of the History of Science at Harvard University. Her books include the acclaimed two-volume biography, Charles Darwin: Voyaging and Charles Darwin: The Power of Place (both 快色直播), which won the National Book Critics Circle Award for Biography and the Pfizer Prize from the History of Science Society. She is also the editor of The Quotable Darwin (快色直播) and the author of Darwin’s Origin of Species: A Biography. She was on the editorial team of the Darwin Correspondence Project at the University of Cambridge, which published Darwin’s correspondence in thirty volumes.
"This book, an abridged version of Browne's two longer Darwin biographies, distills the rich, complicated life of the beloved naturalist into 624 pages. . . . Browne paints a portrait of a man who laughed, wept and struggled his way through the Victorian era as much as he informed it. A dedicated reader will surely find getting acquainted with Browne's Darwin an enjoyable endeavor."鈥擜aron Tremper, Science News
Praise for Janet Browne’s Darwin: Voyaging and The Power of Place “This book deserves the adjectives of praise traditionally used by reviewers to describe masterpieces. . . . It is wonderful and marvelous, even magisterial.”—Stephen Jay Gould, New York Review of 快色直播 “[It] has the commanding sweep and forward drive of a good Victorian novel.”—Ian McEwan, The Guardian “This biography is matchless in detail and compass, and one feels an abiding gratitude that Browne was willing to sacrifice so many years of her life to reconstruct Darwin’s.”—New York Times “A triumph, the closest we can come to getting inside Darwin’s mind.”—Sunday Telegraph “Splendid. . . . A wonderful read.”鈥�Nature “[A] magnificent biography. Integrating the best of current scholarship with her own discoveries, Browne’s account is state of the art.”—Scientific American “An authoritative and highly readable biography which uncovers the complex process of scientific discovery.”鈥�The Independent “Brilliantly penetrating . . . utterly riveting.”鈥�Daily Telegraph
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