Few lives of great men offer so much interest--and so many mysteries--as the life of Charles Darwin, the greatest figure of nineteenth-century science, whose ideas are still inspiring discoveries and controversies more than a hundred years after his death. Yet only now, with the publication of Voyaging, the first of two volumes that will constitute the definitive biography, do we have a truly vivid and comprehensive picture of Darwin as man and as scientist. Drawing upon much new material, supported by an unmatched acquaintance with both the intellectual setting and the voluminous sources, Janet Browne has at last been able to unravel the central enigma of Darwin's career: how did this amiable young gentleman, born into a prosperous provincial English family, grow into a thinker capable of challenging the most basic principles of religion and science? The dramatic story of Voyaging takes us from agonizing personal challenges to the exhilaration of discovery; we see a young, inquisitive Darwin gradually mature, shaping, refining, and finally setting forth the ideas that would at last fall upon the world like a thunderclap in The Origin of Species.
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Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
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Bruce Neville, Univ. of Texas at El Paso Lib.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
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I actually only noticed this book because of the laudatory reviews that appeared recently for volume II ("The Power of Place"). Perhaps it is true that I cannot get enough of Darwin, so I was drawn to this as any addict to his fix. But I think that for me the most appealing thing about Charles Darwin is his quintessential Victorianism. He lived and worked in a privileged position in a culture that was as sublimely self-confident as any the world has ever seen, and that, moreover, bestrode that world as none before or since (our blundering and half-hearted imperialism not excepted).
Actually, the Darwin Story is becoming canonical. Our culture is about the clash of narratives as much as anything else. The Free Market opposes the Welfare State, the Promise of Progress is really the Erosion of Identity, and, most shrilly, the Blind Watchmaker threatens to displace the Christian God.
So, I suppose that to read this book is to choose sides. Shame about that, but there it is. Anyway, even if you know the story, this book (and its sequel) will tell it better and deeper. Janet Browne has not only mastered the Darwin materials, but his milieu as well. She seems to have gone far afield in researching the lives of those that impinged on Darwin, just in order to make throwaway statements and large judgments on people who are perhaps bit players in his life. They, of course, have lives of their own, fully lived, and like a novelist, Browne hints at more that she tells. The occasional summarizing aside of some life that glances on Darwin's gives this book a novelistic texture and feel. The author has pulled off the difficult trick of making us feel she is telling a story that she owns.
Browne starts with a leisurely scene-setting that places the Darwins and the Wedgwoods (Charles's paternal and maternal lines) in the Georgian society of the day. She discusses the culture and the family traditions, and places the players in the landscape and houses them grandly. (Very helpful here is a generous genealogy in the front matter.) We see young Charles carefree and out-of-doors, with his loving and indulgent older sisters and his great friend, older brother Erasmus. We see him rather reluctantly growing up, attending Edinburgh University and then Cambridge, where he is unscathed by the official curricula, but emerges with firm friends among some bug-loving students as well as the naturalists on the faculties.
About one-third of this book covers the voyage of the Beagle, the forming event in Darwin's life as a scientist. Of its five years, Darwin spent more than three of them on land, exploring, collecting, and observing all up and down the coasts of South America and, finally, in islands of the Pacific (including, most famously, the Galapagos).
When Darwin got home his troubles began. All the glorious collecting and larking about of his school days and the grand adventure on the Beagle were over. Those experiences drew on his enthusiasm, energy, and growing expertise in zoology and geology. Now, back home, he had to make something of himself, he had to secure an identity. Could he use the physical materials he had gathered and his position in society to do it? Darwin's real story begins when he steps off the dock after five years away from home.
Browne tells this life in a quietly gripping way. The vast amount of material that she had to integrate does not get in the way of the tale, but allows her to tell it seamlessly. She never lets the narrative bog down in irrelevancies, but always paints a full picture of the scene, giving its human, intellectual and social components their due.
The story of Charles Darwin is really the story of an idea. Darwin was the central figure, but Hooker, Wallace, Lyell, Huxley, and many others had important parts to play. But in the progress of abstract ideas the personal is important: a strong motivation for Darwin's secrecy with his thoughts on evolution was to avoid distressing his wife Emma, a fervent believer in a Heaven where she would be reunited with those siblings and children so cruelly taken from her. Browne always shows this human side to science, shows that science is a quite human endeavor. And in this volume she takes the story up to 1856, as Darwin finally decides to take the plunge, after a dozen years of doubts and obsessive preparations.
Now, he will write a book....
After he writes that book, Darwin's life is never the same. Actually, after that, nobody's life is the same. Big drama is coming up in volume II, so why bother with this book? It is entertaining and brilliantly done, but is just prologue, right?
I disagree. In fact, if you just glance through "The Origin of Species" you will see that Darwin put most of his life up to that point into his book. And his later life was built firmly on the foundation of his earlier: he made the friends and formed the ideas that were to become central in the controversies over natural selection. Themes have been stated and developed. Volume II will develop them further, and introduce new matter, but does not tell a separate story.
Darwin's life is painted with a broad brush. We are given a picture of natural science in Mid-Victorian England. All the players and issues taking place in natural science at that time are illuminated. Miraculously Browne pulls this off without becoming tedious, exhausting, or overhwelming the reader. It's quite a feat.
Browne gives us a peek inside Charles Darwin and we can feel the pull between what is becoming clearly evident to him and the deeply ingrained beliefs of a man who earlier in life was headed for a life as a country parson. He was also upset at how all of this was going to settle on his deeply religious wife. Browne manages this without falling into the trap of psychological analysis, Freudian or otherwise.
I wish all biographies could be as readable and as lucid as this one. As another reviewer here has said: this will become the definitive biography of Darwin's life. I agree. I would rate this book in the top 10 of books of all time on the history of science. Seeing how Darwin is still at center stage in the fight for science education in our schools, this book should be required reading for anyone interested contemporary education or science.
Browne presents the story without a lots of overdramatization. The book is hugely dramatic though the drama comes from the details and not the presentation. It is not a hagiography. There no kettle drums rumbling in the background.
When you read the book you will gain insights into how science grew from an amateur affectation of afternoon beetle collecting trips to the countryside, to a fully recognized profession. Browne miraculously pulls this off without ever leaving sight of Darwin and his life.
Like a good "Perils of Pauline" Saturday morning serial, the volume I leaves off at the most incisive part of Darwin's career, thus leaving thousands of readers waiting breathlessly for Volume II.
The book seems so complete so I passed on reading any other biographies of Darwin, but I did find Adrian Desmond's Huxley : From Devil's Disciple to Evolution's High Priest to be a good companion work and interim filler. T.H. Huxley took up Darwin's cause and became known as "Darwin's Bulldog" This was however just one role that Huxley filled. Huxley himself is also giant of the emerging science movement in Victorian England.
I feel that part of my life is missing until Browne's Volume II arrives.
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