The Discoverers [Paperback]

Daniel J. Boorstin (Author)

Book Description

Release date: February 12, 1985

An original history of man's greatest adventure: his search to discover the world around him.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Perhaps the greatest book by one of our greatest historians, The Discoverers is a volume of sweeping range and majestic interpretation. To call it a history of science is an understatement; this is the story of how humankind has come to know the world, however incompletely ("the eternal mystery of the world," Einstein once said, "is its comprehensibility"). Daniel J. Boorstin first describes the liberating concept of time--"the first grand discovery"--and continues through the age of exploration and the advent of the natural and social sciences. The approach is idiosyncratic, with Boorstin lingering over particular figures and accomplishments rather than rushing on to the next set of names and dates. It's also primarily Western, although Boorstin does ask (and answer) several interesting questions: Why didn't the Chinese "discover" Europe and America? Why didn't the Arabs circumnavigate the planet? His thesis about discovery ultimately turns on what he calls "illusions of knowledge." If we think we know something, then we face an obstacle to innovation. The great discoverers, Boorstin shows, dispel the illusions and reveal something new about the world.

Although The Discoverers easily stands on its own, it is technically the first entry in a trilogy that also includes The Creators and The Seekers. An outstanding book--one of the best works of history to be found anywhere. --John J. Miller

Review

" A remarkable narrative of the grand intellectual venture of humankind, rich in fascinating, often dramatic details"-- (The Wall Street Journal)
" A sumptuous, totally engaging panorama. No one who reads it will look at the chronicle of human ingenuity in the same way again." --David McCullough

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Product Details

• Paperback: 768 pages
• Publisher: Vintage; 1st Vintage Book ed edition (February 12, 1985)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0394726251
• ISBN-13: 978-0394726250
• Product Dimensions: 5.2 x 1.4 x 8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (107 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #14,583 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

54 of 56 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars A PRECIOUS DISCOVERY February 1, 2003

By Luciano Lupini

Format:Hardcover

A truly wonderful book. One that should be used as a textbook in History in high school. Easily readable, it takes the reader on a voyage of far reaching proportions. What is it that makes this book so pleasurable and instructive? A fresh approach to the evolution of knowledge and science as experienced historically by the pioneers. The exploration in retrospective of the discovery of the concept of time and the clock, the compass, the telescope, the microscope and the evolutionary description of the knowledge that mankind acquired through these instruments and the bold steps of the pioneers that wondered around the seas, the cosmos, the mind, etc.. Why is it that modern culture, the different cultures and science are the way they are ? You will find a lot of answers about how this came to happen in the book by the former Librarian of Congress and senior historian of the Smithsonian Institution.
After I read this book, the promise made in the Washington Post Book World's review to it, I found fulfilled: "few indeed will be the readers who do not themselves become discoverers....." This book is one of the most outstanding discoveries that I made in my quest for knowledge. You must not overlook it.

22 of 23 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Popular History in the best sense of the term March 18, 2002

By Fred Schultz

Format:Paperback

Daniel Boorstin's Discoverers is a delight to read. Its sweeping theme is humanity's discovery of the natural and social world we inhabit. There are major sections that deal with the discovery of the calendar and the invention of the clock; the geographical discoveries of the 15th to 18th centuries; the natural world of astronomy, physics, chemistry and biology; and the social world of historiography and economics. An approach of this sort can't help but be anecdotal which might offend the sensibilities of many professional historians. Yet, for educated laymen (and those historians who recognize the importance of well written synthesis and popularization) the anecdotes are valuable illustrations of his theme-- and great fun to read. I learned much from this book: details of the lives and work of such luminaries and Isaac Newton, Christopher Columbus and Adam Smith; also of the lives of lesser known discoverers such as Aldus Manutius, Amerigo Vespucci and the Chinese explorer Cheng Ho. His bibliographic essay at the end is an excellent resource for further reading. I look forward to reading The Creators and The Seekers, the next two books in the trilogy.

37 of 43 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars This was one of my college textbooks. April 27, 2000

By J. Hauer VINE™ VOICE

Format:Paperback

I was very lucky to have Daniel Boorstin's "The Discoverers" assigned as a textbook for an undergraduate class I took back in the spring of 1988 on European Expansion and Colonization from 1450-1750. Ordinarily, history textbooks are a bit dry. I enjoyed reading them enough to end up only one class short of a double major in History, but this one stood out head and shoulders above the rest.

For a change, the text completely held my attention. Instead of only reading the assigned portions, I read the entire book. Upon discussing this with my classmates, I learned that each of them had done the same.

Perhaps my memory is tainted because this was an overall fun class where we studied actual sailable scale models of caravels built using the actual techniques of the time. But, I recently finished re-reading the book and it was just as much fun the eighth or ninth time around. I've read it so many times that I've lost count.

The two sections that I've always found riveting are the discovery of longitude and Captain Cook muddling around Antarctica. This book is just wonderful. I only wish that the sequel, "The Creators", was just as good. I found that one to be a bit rambling.