5/5 stars
An immense amount of research packed into a well-written, fascinating book. Has given me untold new appreciation for the late Georgian scientists and explorers – from a period before the word scientist had even been invented, and where art and science were still far more closely intertwined. This isn’t just Banks, Herschel and Davy – Coleridge also plays a significant role, as do Shelley, Woolstonecraft, Wordsworth.
Is it a bit Anglocentric? Possibly – I don’t know enough about the period to tell. But it does amply show how much scientific dialogue there was between England and France in particular, even during the Napoleonic Wars – a kind of friendly rivalry in which England seemed to have come out on top.
Is it a bit London-centric too? Possibly, though the Davy chapters do feature the Westcounty, and there are references to the later proliferation of provincial scientific associations. And in any case, this is about the initial scientific breakthroughs, not their applications asthe Industrial Revolution spread.
I took my time reading this, as it was an ideal tube journey book – each chapter split into shorter sub-chapters, and all enjoyably worth savouring. Tiny print in the paperback also means this packs in far more words than many books of the same pagecount. Could it have been a far faster read? Yes – but I’m glad I took my time, and that I finally got around to it after years of it lying on the shelf unread.