Andrea Wulf Books

BIOGRAPHY: SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY & MEDICINE. Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1859) is the great lost scientist: more things are named after him than anyone else. There are towns, rivers, mountain ranges, the ocean current that runs along the South American coast, there's a penguin, a giant squid - even the Mare Humboldtianum on the moon. His colourful adventures read like something out of a Boy's Own story: Humboldt explored deep into the rainforest, climbed the world's highest volcanoes and inspired princes and presidents, scientists and poets alike. Napoleon was jealous of him; Simon Bolivar's revolution was fuelled by his ideas; Darwin set sail on the Beagle because of Humboldt; and Jules Verne's Captain Nemo owned all his many books. He simply was, as one contemporary put it, 'the greatest man since the Deluge'.

Before Longitude no one remembered John Harrison. The Invention of Nature does the same for Alexander von Humboldt

One January morning in 1734, cloth merchant Peter Collinson hurried down to the docks at London's Custom House to collect cargo just arrived from John Bartram in the American colonies. But it was not bales of cotton that awaited him, but plants and seeds... Over the next forty years, Bartram would send hundreds of American species to England, where Collinson was one of a handful of men who would foster a national obsession and change the gardens of Britain forever: Philip Miller, author of the bestselling Gardeners Dictionary ; the Swede Carl Linnaeus, whose standardised botanical nomenclature popularised botany; the botanist-adventurer Joseph Banks and his colleague Daniel Solander who both explored the strange flora of Tahiti and Australia on Captain Cook's Endeavou r. This is the story of these men - friends, rivals, enemies, united by a passion for plants. Set against the backdrop of the emerging empire and the uncharted world beyond, The Brother Gardeners tells the story how Britain became a nation of gardeners.

From the Costa Prize-winning author of The Invention of Nature, Magnificent Rebels is a riveting, eye-opening biography of the first Romantics: a revolutionary group of friends based in the small German town of Jena whose modern ideas transformed society and the way we lead our lives today

"A follow-up to the award-winning Andrea Wulf's critically acclaimed history of British gardening, The Founding Gardeners is the story of how George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, John Adams and James Madison's passion for nature, plants, agriculture and gardens shaped the birth of America"--OCLC

On two days in 1761 and 1769 hundreds of astronomers pointed their telescopes towards the skies to observe a rare astronomical event: the transit of Venus across the face of the sun. United by this momentous occasion, scientists from around the globe came together to answer the essential question: how can the universe be measured? In Chasing Venus Andrea Wulf paints a vivid portrait of the rivalries, triumphs and misfortunes that befell these men, along with their passion and determination to succeed. This extraordinary book tells their story and how one single event prompted the first international scientific collaboration.

A stunning historical narrative that reveals 300 years of English culture and society through an exploration of seven great gardens, from Tradescant's designs for Hatfield House to Hampton Court, Chatsworth and Jekyll's famous garden at Hestercombe.

In "Fabelhafte Rebellen" beleuchtet Andrea Wulf die Denkbewegungen um 1800 in Jena, wo Dichter und Philosophen wie Goethe und Hegel das Individuum in den Mittelpunkt stellten. Sie schildert eine Zeit voller leidenschaftlicher Ideen und Skandale, die auch heute noch relevant sind. Das Buch enthält 30 farbige Abbildungen und 2 Karten.

Die Geschichte des größten wissenschaftlichen Abenteuers im 18. Jahrhundert Im Juni 2012 wird die Welt zum Himmel schauen und auf den Venusdurchgang warten. Dieses seltene astronomische Ereignis, bei dem die winzige schwarze Scheibe des Planeten Venus vor der Sonne vorbeizieht, geschieht nur alle 125 Jahre. Andrea Wulf blickt aus diesem Anlass zurück auf den Sommer des Jahres 1769, als beim damaligen Venusdurchgang erstmals Wissenschaftler weltweit zusammenarbeiteten, um den bis dahin unbekannten Abstand zwischen Sonne und Erde exakt zu ermitteln. Dieses erste internationale Wissenschaftsprojekt verband Menschen verschiedener Kontinente und Herkunft. Sie reisten in die entlegensten Regionen, bestanden gefährliche Abenteuer – und scheiterten manchmal an einem Himmel voller Wolken. Ihre Geschichte(n) erzählt Andrea Wulf in einem Wissenschaftsthriller, der an jenen magischen Moment erinnert, als die Dimensionen des Universums erstmals Kontur gewannen.

Alexander von Humboldt (1769–1859) je velký zapomenutý vědec – je po něm pojmenováno více věci, než po komkoli jiném. Existují města, řeky, pohoří, oceánský proud, který se táhne podél pobřeží Jižní Ameriky, pak je tu tučňák, obří chobotnice – dokonce i Humboldtovo moře na Měsíci. Jeho dobrodružství a objevitelské výpravy byly úžasné: Humboldt pronikl hluboko do deštného pralesa, vylezl na nejvyšší sopku na světě a inspiroval šlechtice, prezidenty, vědce i básníky. Žárlil na něj sám Napoleon. Inspiroval i Darwina k plavbě na Beagle. Jules Verne vlastnil mnoho jeho knih. Byl prostě úžasný. Nyní máte příležitost užít si fantastickou cestu po jeho stopách – závody napříč Ruskem nebo mapování tropické řeky plné krokodýlů. Andrea Wulf poukazuje na důležitost jeho myšlenek, a že jsou aktuální i dnes. Humboldt předpověděl změnu klimatu vlivem činnosti člověka již v roce 1800 a jeho objevy a nápady dodnes využívají vědci, ochránci přírody, spisovatelé, politici i umělci. Chtěl znát a rozumět všemu a jeho způsob myšlení překonal dobu.