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A review by corvidaeus
The Voyage of the Beagle: Charles Darwin's Journal of Researches by Charles Darwin
2.0
I started reading this over 2 years ago and have finally finished it, but much of it was a chore to get through and I found myself skipping over sections towards the end because I just wanted it out of my reading pile.
I had been looking forward to hearing about Darwin's writing on ecology and how this would lead him to his later work [b:The Origin of Species|22463|The Origin of Species|Charles Darwin|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1298417570s/22463.jpg|481941]. Unfortunately though, there is actually not a lot of discussion of the flora and fauna besides him listing various species he encountered. Instead, he spends much of the book talking about the geology of the areas he visited, which may be of interest to some, but personally I found uninteresting.
The rest of the book is mostly about the different cultures Darwin spent time with during his travels, however, being a product of colonial-era Britain he has rather a lot of racist and generally unsavoury opinions. Obviously the book is a product of its time and I expected this to a degree, but it becomes difficult to read someone repeatedly describe native people of another country as "dirty", "wretched", and "poor savages".
There were sections I found interesting - the section on the Galapagos islands, in particular - which is why I have given it 2 stars rather than just 1. But overall, the racist, colonialist overtones were too strong, and made it difficult to truly enjoy much of the book.
I had been looking forward to hearing about Darwin's writing on ecology and how this would lead him to his later work [b:The Origin of Species|22463|The Origin of Species|Charles Darwin|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1298417570s/22463.jpg|481941]. Unfortunately though, there is actually not a lot of discussion of the flora and fauna besides him listing various species he encountered. Instead, he spends much of the book talking about the geology of the areas he visited, which may be of interest to some, but personally I found uninteresting.
The rest of the book is mostly about the different cultures Darwin spent time with during his travels, however, being a product of colonial-era Britain he has rather a lot of racist and generally unsavoury opinions. Obviously the book is a product of its time and I expected this to a degree, but it becomes difficult to read someone repeatedly describe native people of another country as "dirty", "wretched", and "poor savages".
There were sections I found interesting - the section on the Galapagos islands, in particular - which is why I have given it 2 stars rather than just 1. But overall, the racist, colonialist overtones were too strong, and made it difficult to truly enjoy much of the book.