Bright Paradise: Victorian Scientific Travellers

Raby, Peter

ISBN 10: 071267392X / ISBN 13: 9780712673921

Published by Pimlico, 1997

About this Item

Type: Book N.B. Small plain label to inside front cover.

Seller Inventory # 059020

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Bright Paradise: Victorian Scientific Travellers
• Publisher: Pimlico
• Publication Date: 1997
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 071267392X
• ISBN 13: 9780712673921
• Binding: Paperback
• Condition: Very Good
• Dust Jacket Condition: No d/j as Published
• Weight: 14 ounces
• Seller catalogs:
  • NATURAL HISTORY

About this title

Synopsis

'A fabulously rich, anecdotal and gripping account of those men and women who ventured out from Britain into the swamps and jungles of the tropics in search, knowingly or not, of the missing link. Through their stoical-sometimes crack-brained-voyages, the shape of the world, geographically and biologically, was elucidated. Never have more significant journeys been made. . . . Enthusiastic, informed and racy, this is one of the most invigorating accounts of the exploits of people from an age whose intrepidity is staggering. ' 'Peter Raby's book follows a disparate crew of botanists, scientists and collectors, who tried to order the earthly paradise which unfolded around them. Entrepreneurs they may have been - many were dependent on selling their specimens to finance their trips-but they were also scrupulous and sensitive observers. . . . Raby finds some shimmering, personalities. . . . His book is excellent. ' DAILY TELEGRAPH

Review

Were Victorian explorers tools of imperialism? Accomplices in conquest and genocide? Well, perhaps, and even probably. The 19th-century English explorers who sought the origins of the Nile and the heights of the Himalayas saw themselves as agents of excellence, paragons of Victorian values, and they were well aware that they opened the door for compatriots who traveled not for knowledge but for wealth. Peter Raby examines the lives and work of the great Victorian peripatetic scientists, defending them from their modern detractors and highlighting the accomplishments of those who climbed mountains in search of tea and crossed jungles in quest of orangutans and cities of gold. Some were hapless, like the snakebit Henry Walter Bates; others were fearless, like Captain Sir Richard Francis Burton, the archetype of adventure. All were interesting, and Raby does a fine job of presenting them to us.