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The age of wonder : how the Romantic generation discovered the beauty and terror of science / Richard Holmes.

By: Language: English Publisher: London : Harper Perennial, 2009Description: 554 s. illISBN:
  • 9780007149537
  • 0007149530
Subject(s): Genre/Form: DDC classification:
  • 509.4109033 22
LOC classification:
  • Q127.G4
Other classification:
  • 02.01
  • Be-e.4
  • U:k
Summary: "The Age of Wonder" explores the earliest ideas of deep time and space, and the explorers of "dynamic science": an infinite, mysterious Nature waiting to be discovered. Three lives dominate the book: William Herschel, his sister Caroline, and Humphry Davy.
Holdings
Item type Current library Shelving location Call number Status Date due Barcode Item holds
Book Biblioteket HKR Biblioteket 509 Holmes Available 11156000167804
Total holds: 0

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

Shortlisted for the Samuel Johnson Prize and winner of the Royal Society Prize for Science Books, Richard Holmes's dazzling portrait of the age of great scientific discovery is a groundbreaking achievement.

The book opens with Joseph Banks, botanist on Captain Cook's first Endeavour voyage, who stepped onto a Tahitian beach in 1769 fully expecting to have located Paradise. Back in Britain, the same Romantic revolution that had inspired Banks was spurring other great thinkers on to their own voyages of artistic and scientific discovery - astronomical, chemical, poetical, philosophical - that together made up the 'age of wonder'.

In this breathtaking group biography, Richard Holmes tells the stories of the period's celebrated innovators and their great scientific discoveries: from telescopic sight to the miner's lamp, and from the first balloon flight to African exploration.

Originally published: London: HarperPress, 2008.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

"The Age of Wonder" explores the earliest ideas of deep time and space, and the explorers of "dynamic science": an infinite, mysterious Nature waiting to be discovered. Three lives dominate the book: William Herschel, his sister Caroline, and Humphry Davy.