Hardcover, 560 pages
German language
Published Oct. 11, 2016 by C. Bertelsmann Verlag.
Was hat Alexander von Humboldt, der vor mehr als 150 Jahren starb, mit Klimawandel und Nachhaltigkeit zu tun? Der Naturforscher und Universalgelehrte, nach dem nicht nur unzählige Straßen, Pflanzen und sogar ein 'Mare' auf dem Mond benannt sind, hat wie kein anderer Wissenschaftler unser Verständnis von Natur als lebendigem Ganzen, als Kosmos, in dem vom Winzigsten bis zum Größten alles miteinander verbunden ist und dessen untrennbarer Teil wir sind, geprägt. Die Historikerin Andrea Wulf stellt Humboldts Erfindung der Natur, die er radikal neu dachte, ins Zentrum ihrer Erkundungsreise durch sein Leben und Werk. Sie folgt den Spuren des begnadeten Netzwerkers und zeigt, dass unser heutiges Wissen um die Verwundbarkeit der Erde in Humboldts Überzeugungen verwurzelt ist. Ihm heute wieder zu begegnen, mahnt uns, seine Erkenntnisse endlich zum Maßstab unseres Handelns zu machen – um unser aller Überleben willen.
A monster of a book. Apart from knowing Humboldt’s name from the off geographical feature I knew nothing of this man and his epic life. So much of what we now know about nature stems from his activities and it is a measure of this that 50% into the book is his death - the rest is tracing the effects of his work on further household names. Not an easy read.....
This could have been a straightforward biography. It could have followed Humbolt as the traveled to South America and meticulously recorded and collects plants, animals, rocks and even measured the blueness of the sky. It could have recounted the people he knew and the books that he wrote.
The Invention of Nature does all of that, but it is so much more. This is the history of an idea. It is an idea that we've grown so used to that we don't think about it any more than a fish thinks about water.
Wulf takes us on Humbolt's journey to South America to the top of Chimborazo where he looks down realizes that everything is interconnected, that we can't truly understand what is happening in the world by boiling things down to just bare facts, that paying attention our emotional response to the world helps us understand the world.
Wulf …
This could have been a straightforward biography. It could have followed Humbolt as the traveled to South America and meticulously recorded and collects plants, animals, rocks and even measured the blueness of the sky. It could have recounted the people he knew and the books that he wrote.
The Invention of Nature does all of that, but it is so much more. This is the history of an idea. It is an idea that we've grown so used to that we don't think about it any more than a fish thinks about water.
Wulf takes us on Humbolt's journey to South America to the top of Chimborazo where he looks down realizes that everything is interconnected, that we can't truly understand what is happening in the world by boiling things down to just bare facts, that paying attention our emotional response to the world helps us understand the world.
Wulf traces both Humbolt's influences and those he influenced, but is those he influenced that is the most remarkable. From Darwin to Thoreau to Muir, traces Humbolt's grand ideas through to the birth of the beginnings of the environmentalism. She makes a powerful argument that we still have much to learn from Humbolt.
As thrilling as Humbolt's travels in South America are, Wulf's telling of the journey of his idea is more more thrilling still.
I'd recommend this book to anyone who is fascinated with science, but still looks up at the stars with wonder. You will find kindrid spirits in Humbolt and those who were inspired by him
This a wonderful book about one of the most greatest polymaths and inter-disciplinarians of all time.
Alexander von Humboldt is a forgotten hero of science, a restless explorer, a passionate scientist, “a man who sought to see and understand everything” and could speak to the soul of people.
