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The Invention of Nature
The Invention of Nature
Alexander von Humboldt's New World
by Andrea Wulf
Alexander von Humboldt (1769 - 1859) was an intrepid explorer and the most famous scientist of his age. His restless life was packed with adventure and discovery, whether climbing the highest volcanoes in the world or racing through anthrax-infested Siberia. He came up with a radical vision of nature, that it was a complex and interconnected global force and did not exist for man's use alone. Ironically, his ideas have become so accepted and widespread that he has been nearly forgotten. Now Andrea Wulf brings the man and his achievements back into focus: his investigation of wild environments around the world; his discoveries of similarities between climate zones on different continents; his prediction of human-induced climate change; his remarkable ability to fashion poetic narrative out of scientific observation; and his relationships with iconic figures such as Simón Bolívar and Thomas Jefferson. Wulf examines how his writings inspired other naturalists and poets such as Wordsworth, Darwin, and Goethe, and she makes the compelling case that it was Humboldt's influence on John Muir that led him to his ideas of preservation and that shaped Thoreau's Walden. Humboldt was the most interdisciplinary of scientists and is the forgotten father of environmentalism. With this brilliantly researched and compellingly written book, she makes clear the myriad, fundamental ways that Humboldt created our understanding of the natural world.
Alexander von Humboldt (1769 - 1859) was an intrepid explorer and the most famous scientist of his age. His restless life was packed with adventure and discovery, whether climbing the highest volcanoes in the world or racing through anthrax-infested Siberia. He came up with a radical vision of nature, that it was a complex and interconnected global force and did not exist for man's use alone. Ironically, his ideas have become so accepted and widespread that he has been nearly forgotten. Now Andrea Wulf brings the man and his achievements back into focus: his investigation of wild environments around the world; his discoveries of similarities between climate zones on different continents; his prediction of human-induced climate change; his remarkable ability to fashion poetic narrative out of scientific observation; and his relationships with iconic figures such as Simón Bolívar and Thomas Jefferson. Wulf examines how his writings inspired other naturalists and poets such as Wordsworth, Darwin, and Goethe, and she makes the compelling case that it was Humboldt's influence on John Muir that led him to his ideas of preservation and that shaped Thoreau's Walden. Humboldt was the most interdisciplinary of scientists and is the forgotten father of environmentalism. With this brilliantly researched and compellingly written book, she makes clear the myriad, fundamental ways that Humboldt created our understanding of the natural world.
Reviews-
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The slight, distinctive burr in David Drummond's voice makes him a natural reader for adventure fantasy, but maybe more a matter of taste for historical biography such as this. Either way, this masterful "life and times" of one of the nineteenth century's eminent naturalists, explorers, and international celebrities will appeal to a wide audience, and deservedly so. In America, Alexander von Humboldt is, or up until now has been, almost forgotten. Yet any number of rivers and countries commemorate his name, and he originated many of the ideas of the interconnectedness of nature that prevail today. As she does in her wonderful BROTHER GARDENERS and FOUNDING GARDENERS, Wulf chronicles a history outside the distractions of war, politics, and national boundaries, where knowledge is pursued for its own sake, and shared by all. D.A.W. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2015, Portland, Maine
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Starred review from July 20, 2015
Wulf (Chasing Venus) makes an impassioned case for the reinstatement of the boundlessly energetic, perpetually curious, prolific polymath von Humboldt (1769–1859) as a key figure in the history of science. She marshals as evidence evocative descriptions of his expeditions—measuring instruments in hand—through the most brutal terrains of South America and Russia; delightful stories of his inspired interactions with other contemporary luminaries, including Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Thomas Jefferson, and Simon Bolívar; and demonstrations of his personal and intellectual influence on later seekers of truth in nature such as Charles Darwin, Henry David Thoreau, and Ernst Haeckel. But the greatest single idea Wulf credits von Humboldt with establishing is the interconnectedness of nature—the animated, interactive forces of life he described as a “living whole” that bound organisms in a “net-like intricate fabric”—rather than the mechanistic, taxonomic schema of his predecessors, from von Humboldt’s early explanation of plant life in the Andes through his Naturgemälde to his encyclopedic work, Cosmos. Wulf also works hard to show that von Humboldt was a good person by modern standards, featuring his progressive, humanitarian ideas against oppression and slavery. Wulf’s stories of wilderness adventure and academic exchange flow easily, and her affection for von Humboldt is contagious. Maps & illus. -
January 1, 2016
Although he was, according to Wulf (The Founding Gardeners), one of the most famous men of the early 19th century, Alexander von Humboldt is something of a footnote today, better known for his eponymous squid, current, and glacier than for his prodigious literary output. A tireless polymath and explorer, Humboldt undertook expeditions to four continents, collecting botanical and animal specimens and making countless measurements of phenomena from atmospheric pressure to the degree of blueness of the sky. Wulf argues that Humboldt's early romantic envisioning of the natural world as an interconnected, living web had a profound influence on the work of contemporary luminaries ranging from Goethe to Darwin to Thoreau. David Drummond does an outstanding job communicating both the author's enthusiasm for her subject and Humboldt's own rapturous feelings about the world. Despite feeling occasionally padded with an excess of biographic detail on some of Humboldt's acolytes, this work does great justice to a neglected forebear of modern environmentalism. VERDICT Highly recommended for students of the history of science and environmentalism. ["Stimulating reading for those interested in general history, natural history, exploration, science, and philosophy": LJ 11/15/15 starred review of the Knopf hc.]--Forrest Link, Coll. of New Jersey Lib., Ewing
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