So why did Browne write this biography of Darwin’s book?  There is a
series of a dozen or more books called Books That Changed the World and
Browne’s new work talks about one of those books: Darwin’s l859 powerhouse
On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the
Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life – quite a mouthful
but that’s the title.  For those who are interested, other books in this
series can be found on Amazon.com.
So here we have author Browne writing about Darwin’s book, a real piece of
scientific literature that literally shook the world both on its initial
publication and for the years after until the present day.
Browne actually goes a bit further because she goes into just enough
detail to give us a very clear picture of Charles Darwin the man – his
youth, his background and education, his shopping about for a career
before he was invited at age 20 to be a part of the five year round the
world voyage on a ship called the Beagle, a trip by a man really in search
of himself and there is little doubt that as those years rolled by Darwin
found not only himself but also a mass and wealth of facts and ideas that
when put down on paper changed humankind’s thinking about where each of us
came from way back when…hundreds of centuries ago.
Many of us might have the thought that Darwin’s principle cause was
upsetting the status quo in Great Britain at that time, the very staid,
ultra religious Victorian age…in fact throughout much of the world,
similar views where held, regardless of the religion involved.  But to
cause a profound upset and to turn human thought into massive turmoil was
never Darwin’s aim.  Setting down, for all to read and hopefully
understand, scientific facts as he saw them was, in it simplest form, all
that Darwin wanted to do.  He did it.  What men and women did with his
book is another story altogether.
According to Browne and documented research Darwin was a very good man, a
fine family gentleman, a man well thought of, well spoken of, actually a
fun guy to have in the community.  That the world, subsequent to the
publication of his book, turned him into a controversial figure was not
his doing, rather it was what the rest of us did to him that has caused
the non-stop blow-up.  Darwin’s idea, to add to and clarify scientific,
naturalist knowledge has over the years turned him into an historical
character of notoriety – but once again this is our doing, not his.
Janet Browne’s small 150-page book published by Atlantic Monthly Press is
enlightening in many respects.  Her aim is not to quell the Darwin storm,
rather in simple language this author presents a clear picture of an
interesting man’s book that gave the world something new to think about
and in the final analysis did what it as supposed to do – add
substantially to a body of knowledge currently in existence.

Tim Wholey is a freelance writer in Narragansett.