Janet Browne (2) (1950–)

Some of my favorite quotations are from Darwin. This collection shows what an intelligent, level-headed and humble man he was. To me, the great genius of his works is not that they show such brilliant intuition, but, on the contrary, they show methodical collection of appropriate data, wide reading, evidence of extensive discussion with his colleagues (and pigeon fanciers), and the application of the thoughts of Lyell and Malthus. If you've never read On the Origin of Species, even if you have little interest, you should pick it up and read a chapter or two. Unlike other seminal works, e.g. Newton's Principia.., it is immediately accessible.
The comments about and from his friends and family are especially moving. In the chapter on recollections from his family is this:
The way he brought us up is shown by a little story about my brother Leonard, which my father was fond of telling. He came into the drawing room and found Leonard dancing on the sofa, which was forbidden, for the sake of the springs, and said, “Oh, Lenny, Lenny, that is against all rules,” and received for answer, “Then I think you’d better go out of the room.”… (mer)

This book was disappointing, although not actually bad. I had hoped for more, since I have seen Janet Browne's biography of Darwin much praised. The promise of the title is that this book is about "The Origin", but it is not, it's just a capsule biography of Darwin and a discussion of the theory of evolution both as proposed by Darwin and as it has been amended and challenged more recently. You, the reader, can easily do better than this book. For a brief biography of Darwin himself, you could do far worse than to read Thomas Henry Huxley's obituary for the Royal Society in the volume of his collected essays titled "Darwiniana". For a more contemporary biography and a discussion of the meaning of and reactions to Darwin's theory you can try "The Reluctant Mr. Darwin" by David Quammen or indeed, "Charles Darwin: The Concise Story of an Extraordinary Man". If you want to get into more depth about the Darwinian legacy, "Darwin's Spectre: Evolutionary Biology in the Modern World" by Michael Rose, would be a better choice. Or, go to the source, "The Origin" is a very pleasant listen, especially as narrated by David Case.

Sadly, this book adds nothing to the existing corpus of Darwin biography and analysis.… (mer)