The Age of Wonder: How the Romantic Generation Discovered the Beauty and Terror of Science

Awards

• Shortlisted for BBC Samuel Johnson Prize for Non-fiction 2009.
• Shortlisted for Dingle Prize 2009.

Overview

Richard Holmes, prize-winning biographer of Coleridge and Shelley, explores the scientific ferment that swept across Britain at the end of 18th century in his ground-breaking new biography 'The Age of Wonder'. 'The Age of Wonder' is Richard Holmes's first major work of biography in over a decade. It has been inspired by the scientific ferment that swept through Britain at the end of the eighteenth century, 'The Age of Wonder' and which Holmes now radically redefines as 'the revolution of Romantic Science'. The book opens with Joseph Banks, botanist on Captain Cook's first Endeavour voyage, stepping onto a Tahitian beach in 1769, hoping to discover Paradise. Many other voyages of discovery swiftly follow, while Banks, now President of the Royal Society in London, becomes our narrative guide to what truly emerges as an Age of Wonder. Banks introduces us to the two scientific figures that dominate the book: astronomer William Herschel and chemist Humphry Davy.Herschel's tireless dedication to the stars, assisted (and perhaps rivalled) by his comet-finding sister Caroline, changed forever the public conception of the solar system, the Milky Way galaxy and the meaning of the universe itself. Davy first shocked the scientific community with his near-suicidal gas experiments in Bristol, then went on to save thousands of lives with his Safety Lamp and established British chemistry as the leading professional science in Europe. But at the cost, perhaps, of his own heart. Holmes proposes a radical vision of science before Darwin, exploring the earliest ideas of deep time and deep space, the creative rivalry with the French scientific establishment, and the startling impact of discovery on great writers and poets such as Mary Shelley, Coleridge, Byron and Keats. With his trademark sense of the human drama, he shows how great ideas and experiments are born out of lonely passion, how scientific discoveries (and errors) are made, how intense relationships are forged and broken by research, and how religious faith and scientific truth collide.The result is breathtaking in its originality, its story-telling energy, and not least, in its intellectual significance.

Full Product Details

Author:   Richard Holmes
Publisher:   HarperCollins Publishers
Imprint:   HarperPress
Weight:   0.944kg
ISBN:  

9780007149520

ISBN 10:   0007149522
Pages:   380
Publication Date:   26 August 2008
Format:   Hardback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   In stock with our local or international supplier.  
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Table of Contents

Reviews

Energetic analysis of the Romantic Age of Science. Romanticism, the deeply emotional artistic movement of the second half of the 18th century, was partly a reaction against the pragmatism of Enlightenment scientists. However, British historian Holmes (Sidetracks: Explorations of a Romantic Biographer, 2000, etc.) writes, the divide between scientific endeavors and artistic pursuits was not always so clearly delineated. The author focuses primarily on the lives of two men who straddled both worlds, who embraced Romantic science and pursued it with the passion of poets or painters. Astronomer William Herschel, who discovered the planet Uranus in 1781, started his career as a musician. That led to an interest in mathematics and then astronomy, which he pursued with the same emotional fervor as any classical music piece. He even compared his skill at seeing astronomical phenomena with the skill required to play Handel's fugues. Holmes also looks at the British chemist Humphry Davy, who, among other accomplishments, discovered that chlorine and iodine were elements. Early on, Davy wrote poetry, and later became friends with Samuel Taylor Coleridge. One of his poems celebrated science, whose delicious water flows / From Nature's bosom. Davy's enthusiasm led to risky, self-destructive behavior - he often inhaled strange chemical gases as experiments, a practice that nearly killed him. While partaking of nitrous oxide with acquaintances, he extolled the glories of science: I dream of Science restoring to Nature what Luxury, what Civilization have stolen from her - pure hearts, the forms of angels, bosoms beautiful, and panting with Joy & Hope. Davy may have had a brilliant scientist's brain, but he had the heart and soul of a poet. How these two contradictory ideas not only coexisted, but flourished together during the Romantic era, makes for engrossing reading.Enjoyable excavation of a time when science and art fed off each other, to the benefit of both communities. (Kirkus Reviews)

'Exuberant...Holmes suffuses his book with the joy, hope and wonder of the revolutionary era. Reading it is like a holiday in a sunny landscape, full of fascinating bypaths that lead to unexpected vistas...it succeeds inspiringly John Carey, Sunday Times ' The Age of Wonder gives us...a new model for scientific exploration and poetic expression in the Romantic period. Informative and invigorating, generous and beguiling, it is, indeed, wonderful' Jenny Uglow, Guardian 'This is a book to linger over, to savour the tantalising details of the minor figures... The Age of Wonder allows readers to recapture the combined thrill of emerging scientific order and imaginative creativity' Lisa Jardine, Financial Times 'If ever there was an argument for a biographical analysis of complex scientific and technological history, this is it...well paced and rich in detail...Heartbreaking accounts of hope and fears, ambitions and disappointments dance along the pages. Even the choice of pictures gives us new insights into old favourites...There is no dry page in this visceral, spirited and sexy account' The Times 'Richard Holmes's stellar collective biography...gives a gripping account of the scientific research that inspired a sense of wonder in poets and experimenters alike...fascinating...this beautifully crafted book deserves all the praise it will undoubtedly attract. Well-researched and vividly written The Age of Wonder will fascinate scientists and poets alike' Literary Review 'Holmes triumphantly shows the Romantic age was one of symbiosis rather than opposition...no biographer is better than Holmes at evoking the thrill of the chase...elegant ...fascinating...entrancing' Sunday Telegraph 'Exhilarating...instructive and delightful...finely observed...generous and hugely enjoyable' Daily Telegraph 'Romanticism and Science are justly reunited in Richard Holmes's new book...a revelation...thrilling' Independent Vividly conveys the compelling fusion of art and science in the 18th century!his is a book to linger over, to savour the tantalising details of the minor figures!'The Age of Wonder' allows readers to recapture the combined thrill of emerging scientific order and imaginative creativity Financial Times 'wonderfully engaging!Holmes brilliantly illuminates the human and subjective aspects of science-making' Scotsman The Age of Wonder gives us!a new model for scientific exploration and poetic expression in the Romantic period. Informative and invigorating, generous and beguiling, it is, indeed, wonderful Guardian delicious...exuberant and thought-provoking New Statesman Praise for Coleridge: Early Visions 'One of the greatest literary biographies ever written.' Daily Telegraph 'Dazzling. A biography like few I have ever read.' James Wood, Guardian Praise for Coleridge: Darker Reflections 'One of the greatest biographies of the century. Pure joy to read, it is a shimmering portrait of the mature artist veering between brilliance and despair' Financial Times 'This - and I can't remember ever thinking this before so strongly - is a biography to grow old with' Independent Praise for Shelley: The Pursuit 'If the art of biography was ever damned, Shelley: The Pursuit redeemed it.' New York Times Praise for Dr Johnson and Mr Savage 'As tense as a detective story and as rich as a Hogarth print, this is the work of a master-biographer.' John Carey, Sunday Times Praise for Footsteps 'This exhilarating book, part biography, part autobiography, shows the biographer as sleuth and huntsman, tracking his subjects through space and time.' Hilary Spurling, Observer 'Nothing is simple in this intricate, complicated and fascinating book, which is like a set of Russian dolls, biography containing travel-writing containing autobiography containing and so on! Holmes is indeed a biographer and a romantic in every sense.' Richard Boston, Guardian Praise for Sidetracks 'A masterful study of the human heart - his, yours, mine - demonstrating that, in the right hands, biography can be the most dazzling literary form of all.' Sara Wheeler, Daily Telegraph

Author Information

Richard Holmes is a Fellow of the British Academy, Professor of Biographical Studies at the University of East Anglia (2001-2007), has honorary doctorates from UEA, Kingston and the Tavistock Institute, and was awarded an OBE in 1992. His first book, Shelley: The Pursuit, won the Somerset Maugham Prize in 1974. Coleridge: Early Visions won the 1989 Whitbread Book of the Year Award, and Dr Johnson & Mr Savage won the James Tait Black Prize. Coleridge: Darker Reflections won the Duff Cooper Prize and the Heinemann Award. He has published two studies of European biography, Footsteps: Adventures of a Romantic Biographer in 1985, and Sidetracks: Explorations of a Romantic Biographer in 2000.The Romantic Poets and their Circle was published by the National Portrait Gallery in 2005 and his most recent book, The Age of Wonder, was published in October 2008. He lives in London and Norfolk with the novelist Rose Tremain.

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