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Stephen Jay Gould
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Dinosaur in a Haystack: Reflections in Natural History Paperback – December 17, 1996

by Stephen Jay Gould (Author)
4.5 4.5 out of 5 stars 33 ratings
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Gould's seventh collection of essays covers a wide range of subjects in natural history, literature, and popular culture--from the wisdom of Charles Darwin to that of the Old Testament Psalms, from the dinosaurs of Jurassic Park to the dinosaurs of the latest scientific theories, from the thwarted humanity of the Frankenstein monster to the inhuman fallacies of eugenics and other pseudoscience. With black and white illustrations.

"Here is a new collection of Gould's unexpected connections between evolution and all manner of subjects, literature high among them. Gathered from his monthly column in Natural History magazine, these articles should delight, surprise, and inform his vast readership, as have his six prior volumes of essays. Somehow the light bulb pops on every month as his deadline approaches, some glowing fact pulled out of memory--often a line from Shakespeare or Tennyson--that illumines a                    generality Gould wishes to discuss. "Nature, red in tooth and claw" (Lord Alfred's line) induces dilations on the extent science can inform moral matters (not much, Gould believes); a remembrance of the infamous Wansee protocol prompts Gould's denunciation of the genocidal looting of evolutionary theory and, by extension, its vulnerability to ignoramuses in general. These two examples of the Gouldian essay method, fortunately, don't foreshadow a gloomy parade of topics: Gould can as easily alight at the fun house where mass culture absorbs ideas about evolution through movies of monsters run amok from Frankenstein to Jurassic Park. In other essays, he plunges directly into matters of evolutionary interpretation but customarily employs a literary twist: who else but Gould could link Edgar Allan Poe with his own area of professional eminence, the paleontology of snails? A discovery awaits in every essay--in every haystack--which solidifies Gould as one of the most eloquent science popularizers writing today."
--Booklist
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  1. Print length
    496 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    Three Rivers Press
  4. Publication date
    December 17, 1996
  5. Dimensions
    6 x 1 x 9 inches
  6. ISBN-10
    0517888246
  7. ISBN-13
    978-0517888247
  8. See all details
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Editorial Reviews

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... consistently graceful ... [H]e is an incomparable explainer of difficult ideas.... -- The New York Times Book Review, Phillip Lopate

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Gould's seventh collection of essays covers a wide range of subjects in natural history, literature, and popular culture--from the wisdom of Charles Darwin to that of the Old Testament Psalms, from the dinosaurs of Jurassic Park to the dinosaurs of the latest scientific theories, from the thwarted humanity of the Frankenstein monster to the inhuman fallacies of eugenics and other pseudoscience. With black and white illustrations.

"Here is a new collection of Gould's unexpected connections between evolution and all manner of subjects, literature high among them. Gathered from his monthly column in Natural History magazine, these articles should delight, surprise, and inform his vast readership, as have his six prior volumes of essays. Somehow the light bulb pops on every month as his deadline approaches, some glowing fact pulled out of memory--often a line from Shakespeare or Tennyson--that illumines a                    generality Gould wishes to discuss. "Nature, red in tooth and claw" (Lord Alfred's line) induces dilations on the extent science can inform moral matters (not much, Gould believes); a remembrance of the infamous Wansee protocol prompts Gould's denunciation of the genocidal looting of evolutionary theory and, by extension, its vulnerability to ignoramuses in general. These two examples of the Gouldian essay method, fortunately, don't foreshadow a gloomy parade of topics: Gould can as easily alight at the fun house where mass culture absorbs ideas about evolution through movies of monsters run amok from Frankenstein to Jurassic Park. In other essays, he plunges directly into matters of evolutionary interpretation but customarily employs a literary twist: who else but Gould could link Edgar Allan Poe with his own area of professional eminence, the paleontology of snails? A discovery awaits in every essay--in every haystack--which solidifies Gould as one of the most eloquent science popularizers writing today."
--Booklist

Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Three Rivers Press; Reprint edition (December 17, 1996)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Paperback ‏ : ‎ 496 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0517888246
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0517888247
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 3.75 pounds
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6 x 1 x 9 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.5 4.5 out of 5 stars 33 ratings

About the author

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Stephen Jay Gould

Stephen Jay Gould

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Stephen Jay Gould (1941-2002) was the Alexander Agassiz Professor of Zoology and Professor of Geology at Harvard University. He published over twenty books, received the National Book and National Book Critics Circle Awards, and a MacArthur Fellowship.

Customer reviews

4.5 out of 5 stars
33 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

Arieh
5.0 out of 5 stars A fabulous read
Reviewed in the United States on December 30, 2023
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Excellent
One person found this helpful
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James Paschall
5.0 out of 5 stars Technical…fox biologists or natural history enthusiasts.
Reviewed in the United States on May 18, 2022
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Great book…great delivery.
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brutus
5.0 out of 5 stars Gould rocks
Reviewed in the United States on August 20, 2018
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What can I say - Gould was one of the best. Read it. Love it.
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Mickey D
5.0 out of 5 stars Another Gould classic
Reviewed in the United States on January 21, 2017
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Good buy in used books
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Jake a
4.0 out of 5 stars It's a decent book, some chapters were harder to ...
Reviewed in the United States on February 12, 2018
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It's a decent book, some chapters were harder to understand and appreciate than others. I bought it for a college class It served it's purpose well.
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xiang ma
5.0 out of 5 stars Five Stars
Reviewed in the United States on November 23, 2014
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good
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Bradley L Kautz
2.0 out of 5 stars Something is missing
Reviewed in the United States on May 5, 2014
Dinosaur in a Haystack is a collection of 34 essays by Harvard paleontologist Stephen Jay Gould. Each essay involves some aspect of natural history as it intersects with contemporary life. The essays were originally published in the journal Nature, and this volume joins several other previous collections of Gould's work, including Hen's Teeth and Horse's Toes and The Flamingo's Smile.

I read those two particular books about 30 years ago and remembered them fondly. I had anticipated the same previous delight in Gould's prose and the way in which he could make the sometimes esoteric aspects of natural history alive and relevant to today. I was disappointed. As I read through this volume it became apparent that what had changed was not Gould, but I.

Gould is a scientist, first-and foremost. Holding a chair at Harvard places him among the most distinguished of his profession, and as such, I would say that he faithfully holds to the party line. And that respect I mean that he is as Darwinian as they come. He has intimate acquaintance with the content of Darwin's The Origin of the Species and in my reading of Gould I find that Darwin is his touchstone. It is Darwin's work that forms the organizing place for everything else that takes place within natural history.

With Darwin as his foundation, and an unshakable one at that, for Gould, there exists, in Gould's view, no place at all for any other possible way of organizing creation. Which is to say that Gould makes no allowance for even the most remote possibility that there was a divine creator of the universe. This perspective comes through his persistently, and I thought quite curiously, as well.

The curious part is that Gould, as a product of a public school education in the 1950's, combined with his own former religious practice as a Jew, is much more fluent in the words of the Bible than the average person and he consistently incorporates scriptural references into his writing. Unfortunately, he uses them in an entirely secular fashion, missing entirely the Creator that they point to.

So Gould, and I approach the natural world from vantage points that have irreconcilable suppositions. His, per Darwin, as that the world that we know came about entirely through natural processes, without any involvement on the part of the divine. And for myself, I have come to understand that the complexity of the world is too vast for there to be anything but the involvement of a Creator. Both Gould's point and mine require accepting some things that cannot be fully explained. The difference is that I find plausible the words of the Bible for creation, while he finds the same words as window dressing for natural history.
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asad
3.0 out of 5 stars Intersting
Reviewed in the United States on January 28, 2008
Not bad, not amazing. This collection of essays does a good job of opening the mind and they're decently written. Nothing awe-striking, but commendable.
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Top reviews from other countries

JDK
5.0 out of 5 stars Gould is always a pleasure to read!
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on April 22, 2022
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Gould has a way of uncomplicating highly complex problems, with style. Everything under his pen is a delight, both scientific and literary.
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