Irmscher makes a convincing case that this egotistical, often wrongheaded figure deserves his reputation as a founder and...
A thoroughly satisfying biography of the almost but not quite forgotten Swiss-born Louis Agassiz (1807–1873), who moved to the United States in 1846 to become a combination of educator, media star and beloved science guru.
Though Agassiz’s genuine scientific contributions, such as the classification of extinct fish, had little popular appeal, his contemporaries thrilled at his assertion that great ice sheets had once covered the continents. Others had the idea earlier; the fiercely ambitious Agassiz took credit, but Irmscher (English/Indiana Univ.; Longfellow Redux, 2006) adds that his energetic research, writing and lectures won over the scientific community. Nowadays, Agassiz is mostly known for stubbornly opposing Darwinian evolution, preferring his version of a glorious nature filled with unchanging, divinely created species. This had no effect on his immense popularity but marginalized him among scientists. Sympathetic to his subject, Irmscher recounts the surprising amount of ridicule he received from evolutionists, including the usually benign Darwin. While admitting that Agassiz missed the boat, the author maintains that, for all his posturing and self-promotion and the offensive, pseudo-scientific racism fashionable at the time, he was an inspirational, insightful and unwearying scientific observer. His voluminous collection and publications remain impressive achievements.
Irmscher makes a convincing case that this egotistical, often wrongheaded figure deserves his reputation as a founder and first great popularizer of American science.Pub Date: Feb. 5, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-547-57767-8
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2012
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
The author's youthfulness helps to assure the inevitable comparison with the Anne Frank diary although over and above the...
Elie Wiesel spent his early years in a small Transylvanian town as one of four children.
He was the only one of the family to survive what Francois Maurois, in his introduction, calls the "human holocaust" of the persecution of the Jews, which began with the restrictions, the singularization of the yellow star, the enclosure within the ghetto, and went on to the mass deportations to the ovens of Auschwitz and Buchenwald. There are unforgettable and horrifying scenes here in this spare and sombre memoir of this experience of the hanging of a child, of his first farewell with his father who leaves him an inheritance of a knife and a spoon, and of his last goodbye at Buchenwald his father's corpse is already cold let alone the long months of survival under unconscionable conditions.
Pub Date: Jan. 16, 2006
ISBN: 0374500010
Page Count: 120
Publisher: Hill & Wang
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2006
Well-told and admonitory.
Young-rags-to-mature-riches memoir by broker and motivational speaker Gardner.
Born and raised in the Milwaukee ghetto, the author pulled himself up from considerable disadvantage. He was fatherless, and his adored mother wasn’t always around; once, as a child, he spied her at a family funeral accompanied by a prison guard. When beautiful, evanescent Moms was there, Chris also had to deal with Freddie “I ain’t your goddamn daddy!” Triplett, one of the meanest stepfathers in recent literature. Chris did “the dozens” with the homies, boosted a bit and in the course of youthful adventure was raped. His heroes were Miles Davis, James Brown and Muhammad Ali. Meanwhile, at the behest of Moms, he developed a fondness for reading. He joined the Navy and became a medic (preparing badass Marines for proctology), and a proficient lab technician. Moving up in San Francisco, married and then divorced, he sold medical supplies. He was recruited as a trainee at Dean Witter just around the time he became a homeless single father. All his belongings in a shopping cart, Gardner sometimes slept with his young son at the office (apparently undiscovered by the night cleaning crew). The two also frequently bedded down in a public restroom. After Gardner’s talents were finally appreciated by the firm of Bear Stearns, his American Dream became real. He got the cool duds, hot car and fine ladies so coveted from afar back in the day. He even had a meeting with Nelson Mandela. Through it all, he remained a prideful parent. His own no-daddy blues are gone now.
Well-told and admonitory.Pub Date: June 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-06-074486-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Amistad/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2006
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