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kpeeps111's review against another edition
4.0
A very interesting examination of an entire era of philosophy and science, and the meeting between the two. This book is epic in scope, and really gives you a feeling for the Romantic period and the birth of modern science through a personal examination of several leading figures. All of the separate stories are tied together brilliantly into one coherent picture of a whole, leaving one to reflect on the philosophy of science here in the modern day.
giantarms's review against another edition
4.0
Alchemy shifts to chemistry. But more importantly, a dude has adventures in Tahiti and two German ex-pats never sleep.
It's a history of the men and women whose unbounded curiosity allowed them to build on the foundation on the past without fear of hacking out the bad bricks. The book blends scientific discovery with artistic reactions and fascinating biographies of everybody involved. I'd heard of Faraday. I'd never heard of Davy. There wouldn't have been one without the other.
Basically, what I'm trying to say is that "Mungo Park" is the best name ever.
Four stars because it does get a little slow occasionally, but that's only in comparison to the amazing tale that is Banks's experiences in Tahiti.
Also of note: This is single best designed book I've ever handled. It's fat, but the pages lay nicely. The boring citations are all at the end, but the meaty side notes are conveniently there at the bottom of the page. There are color plates whose images are actually referenced in the text. There is an index, a bibliography with further reading, and a cast of characters in case you get confused with all the many, many names. It is like the book was designed by a dude who . . . reads books. Hooray!
It's a history of the men and women whose unbounded curiosity allowed them to build on the foundation on the past without fear of hacking out the bad bricks. The book blends scientific discovery with artistic reactions and fascinating biographies of everybody involved. I'd heard of Faraday. I'd never heard of Davy. There wouldn't have been one without the other.
Basically, what I'm trying to say is that "Mungo Park" is the best name ever.
Four stars because it does get a little slow occasionally, but that's only in comparison to the amazing tale that is Banks's experiences in Tahiti.
Also of note: This is single best designed book I've ever handled. It's fat, but the pages lay nicely. The boring citations are all at the end, but the meaty side notes are conveniently there at the bottom of the page. There are color plates whose images are actually referenced in the text. There is an index, a bibliography with further reading, and a cast of characters in case you get confused with all the many, many names. It is like the book was designed by a dude who . . . reads books. Hooray!
ejdecoster's review against another edition
4.0
Do not let the length of time I spent reading this book fool you - I moved and started a new job while still digging in to chapters of this book. It was interesting as history, as science writing, and as a combination. I would suggest this book for almost anybody interested in reading non-fiction.
samanthabryant's review against another edition
4.0
A fascinating read. What I know of the Romantic period comes from my literature background: Shelley, Keats, Mary Shelley, Wordsworth, Coleridge, etc. I'm pretty woefully ignorant of what else was going on during this time period. I loved learning about how scientific thinking was developing in the context of Romanticism as a societal rather than just literary movement. I loved the historical personages I learned about and the discoveries, mistakes, limitations, etc. If you have any interest in the time period or in science as a field of study, you will probably love this book.
sharon_geitz's review
5.0
I loved this account of 18th/19th century science told through biographical chapters of major figures like Joseph Banks, William Herschel and his sister Caroline, the early balloonists, explorers like Mungo Park and great figures of science like Humphrey Davy and all interlinked with reference to the great poetry and literature of the age. A wonderful account of the romantic age, how romanticism impacted on science and how science impacted on culture. A great readable book that has left me now wanting to read more about some of the central figures in this account.
hjmo's review against another edition
4.0
This book examines the interesting lives of several notable scientists of the late-Georgian era. Beginning with Sir Joseph Banks and the HMS Endeavour and connecting it to Darwin and the HMS Beagle. The research is detailed and the approach brings the men, women, and events to life. The writing is clear but at times the detail slowed the pace for me.
I came into the book with a definite goal as I was reading it to learn more about Sir Joseph and the culture of scientific discovery of the time (novel research). I enjoyed learning about Herschel and the early adventures in ballooning but was less interested in the chapters on Davy. It picked back up again toward the end.
The book was pretty long. I read the first bit on my kindle so I could make notes for research and then listened to the rest.
I came into the book with a definite goal as I was reading it to learn more about Sir Joseph and the culture of scientific discovery of the time (novel research). I enjoyed learning about Herschel and the early adventures in ballooning but was less interested in the chapters on Davy. It picked back up again toward the end.
The book was pretty long. I read the first bit on my kindle so I could make notes for research and then listened to the rest.
blckngld18's review against another edition
3.0
wanted more actual science but learned alot about some of the great scientists of the period.
fallchicken's review against another edition
3.0
Speaking only of the Kindle edition: This is one of the poorest quality Kindle books I've read.
- I'm 15% of the way through the book. My kindle has crashed three times while I've been reading, more than doubling its total number of crashes.
- The editing is the pits. Closed-up hyphens are consistently used as dashes; on a typewriter you could use space-hyphen-space or two hyphens, but modern typography allows you to use a em-dash. This is a dash-y author, so it's really annoying. Too many times I've stumbled over what was being said, only to find it was the wrong punctuation mark. (Having not seen a printed copy, I can't say if this is a problem only in the Kindle edition.)
- Words sometimes have extraneous hyphens.
- There are endnote/footnotes, which are citations to source material, and footnotes within each "chapter". Getting to these (and back) is a major difficulty. First, there's the kindle bug where the first time you go to a note, it wants to go to the dictionary or the web. But when you finally get to the note, getting back to the text is sometimes a challenge.
- This book is almost 600 pages. It is divided in ten (what I would call) sections. Each of these is divided into (what I would call) chapters. But the Kindle compiler calls the bigger things chapters. This means the where-am-I-in-the-chapter indicator doesn't tell you how long to before you reach a reasonable stopping point, unless you're close to the end of the bigger section.
Altogether an annoying Kindle reading experience, even though I'm enjoying the book itself.
The book: The first half of the book was quite a good read, potted biographies of Joseph Banks, William Herschel (and his sister Caroline), and Humphry Davy, scientists of (Britain's) Romantic period. As we move on, the Romanticism begins to dominate. Scientists write poetry, poets write about science. Gets a bit tiring.
- I'm 15% of the way through the book. My kindle has crashed three times while I've been reading, more than doubling its total number of crashes.
- The editing is the pits. Closed-up hyphens are consistently used as dashes; on a typewriter you could use space-hyphen-space or two hyphens, but modern typography allows you to use a em-dash. This is a dash-y author, so it's really annoying. Too many times I've stumbled over what was being said, only to find it was the wrong punctuation mark. (Having not seen a printed copy, I can't say if this is a problem only in the Kindle edition.)
- Words sometimes have extraneous hyphens.
- There are endnote/footnotes, which are citations to source material, and footnotes within each "chapter". Getting to these (and back) is a major difficulty. First, there's the kindle bug where the first time you go to a note, it wants to go to the dictionary or the web. But when you finally get to the note, getting back to the text is sometimes a challenge.
- This book is almost 600 pages. It is divided in ten (what I would call) sections. Each of these is divided into (what I would call) chapters. But the Kindle compiler calls the bigger things chapters. This means the where-am-I-in-the-chapter indicator doesn't tell you how long to before you reach a reasonable stopping point, unless you're close to the end of the bigger section.
Altogether an annoying Kindle reading experience, even though I'm enjoying the book itself.
The book: The first half of the book was quite a good read, potted biographies of Joseph Banks, William Herschel (and his sister Caroline), and Humphry Davy, scientists of (Britain's) Romantic period. As we move on, the Romanticism begins to dominate. Scientists write poetry, poets write about science. Gets a bit tiring.
jayft0312's review against another edition
4.0
Excellent account of early scientists and emerging philosophers, - how they developed the disciplines and brought about new discoveries - and then interlaced with the literary giants of the time, Shelley, Byron, Keats, etc. A rather slow read, but well worth the time.