Here's a professional review of Wellness from the New York Times .... it's a little critical of the "Just so" tidiness but fair. I'm glad I'm not a critic with my innate distaste for criticism.
Here's an interview from the Chicago Review of Books with the author Nathan Hill: (which I will read eventually) And here are few of my rambles. Wellness. A wonderful book of modern life, covering the period from say, 1992 grungey/artistic Chicago up to the modern day, with all the issues that effect our “Wellness” – the internet, knowing too much, trying to control our feelings, our unresolved past, raising kids, the pilot light going out on the romance in our marriage as life becomes a co-managed business enterprise. And it’s all seen through the eyes of a couple that my wife, rightly and accurately, keeps saying “are a lot like us.” Of course, when the husband is obsessed with porn, and overly needy, I wonder, what is she _really_ trying to say? My wife read Wellness with her women’s reading group and then recommended it to me. I’d just finished reading Zone of Interest, which made me fall in love with Martin Amis all over again and made me hate the normalizing of insanity with a burning clarity. But it was a good bounce back from something so dark. Because it’s about real, modern family life and there’s no magic or technical trickery it invites comparison to Jonathan Frantzen. The comparison is apt, particularly when it comes to the near-parody arch-realness of the situations the characters find themselves in. LIke when Elizabeth, reads every study to be the perfect mom to her quirky kid, and all the kid still wants to eat is Kraft mac-and-cheese. Or when they get invited by a couple with an open marriage to a sex club for swingers etc and it ends up that this mismatch of a couple – she’s 26 and he’s this muscle bound middle aged guy – take them each aside and show them who they are with clarity. The overall structure start with their romantic meeting, and then does a bunch of flashbacks to bring us to the present, A tipping point- the tipping point? - in their relationship, when the magic is gone. Jack grew up on a farm in Kansas. Undersized and unwanted by everyone but his older boho sister, who comes to visit and inspire, he becomes an artist and moves to Chicago. Elisabeth is a child of privilege who wants nothing of her family's ill-begotten money. Both Family-of-Origin stories are cartoonishly effed up. Jack's mother never wanted him and let's him know; Elisabeth's father is threatened by her academic prowess and competes with her in really messed up ways. As pointed out in the NY Times review, some very important plot points are withheld, that explain much. Verdict - great, compelling read with alot to say about this situation we've all got ourselves into. So this is "Wellness" - with the internet and all of our ... whatever, intermittent fasting and optimizing and workouts. Enough.
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What do you even write after reading something like this. As the main character says at some point Thomsen: “I used to be numb; now I’m raw.” Here's the New Yorker's review from ten years ago, written by Joyce Carol Oates I read it - with some misgiving, considering the subject matter – because I wanted to read it before the movie. As a narrative it really moved and I believe I learned something new, if in the details, perhaps, though of course the Big Why always eludes. So instead of critiquing the movie, I'll critique the critique - I think JCO misses the main insight - how do we normalize the unspeakable? How can we live our family lives, and go on doing our day-to-day mundanities, eating, sleeping, celebrating holidays, engaging small talk and having affairs, when the very air we breathe smells like the stench of dead bodies? With everything we know and learned and asked and read about the Holocaust, that's a question that hasn't been asked - as far as I know. What about the kids, the wife, the veneer of normalacy over genocide? In the end, maybe the answer is, we can normalize any sort of insanity, given time. And so it's best to stop it when it's still small. Here's the movie trailer, which I will get back to you on. I miss Martin Amis. 880 pages and surprisingly readable, considering the length and topic. What it is, big picture, is a near-future dystopian sci-fi novel based on a what we all hope is a worst case scenario for Global warming. The book follows four-to-five groups of characters through the impending global calamity. One is a over-sexed uber-charismatic activist earth mama and her adoring grad-school creative writer partner (obviously a stand in for the writer, he has the last word) – they end up running an organization called A Fierce Blue Fire, that manages to create a coalition of right wing republicans and environmental The second is a brilliant eco-biologist modeler of things like methane hydrates being released from the ocean floor - among other things accelerating the cascading effects of climate change; three, is a brilliant Muslim-America computer whiz, creating algorithms for betting on the NBA, finances, and global environmental collapse; he ends up being a consultant/lobbyist in in Washington and gives us a glimpse into that world; thThere's a white trash meth addict that's sort of the roadkill on the highway to the capitalist future; and then there's a underground network of "eco-terrorists" sort of like the 60's Weathermen and finally there's even a an advertising art director. So, with all of these separate threads, the book takes a while to set up and get rolling. About 180 pages. There are a number of reviews online where people say "I didn't have any idea what was going on for the first 200 pages but hang in there!" And it is worth the ride. Some of the characters are a bit cringey, admittedly. No one is either not incredibly hot, or brilliant and usually both. Kate Morris, the hot earth mama activist is sort of the leftist version of the pixie dream girl and the fact that she can't stop fucking everyone in sight is a transparently literary symbol - of course she stands for irrepressible, fecund nature. Her writer-boy sidekick is a bit prissy. But aren't we all. But that's about where the negativity ends. For the most part the characters are likeable and smart and though the narrative and language pushes the boundaries of believability - especially in the case of Ashir Al-Hasan, the mathemetican/consultant to DC insiders. But while the language may push the bounds of credulity, the circumstances and storyline, unfortunately, do not. The way the carbon interests double down. The way environmentalism is coopted in the name of "environmental security." How the oligarchical interests-that-be capitalize on the fear and diminishing resources to tighten their grip on control and elevate profits. The widening gap between the haves and have-nots. The public acceptance of what is deemed acceptable in terms of gun violence, misinformation and cataclysmic weather events. Some low lights. A fire takes out LA. one of the characters pulls some strings so that they can take a FEMA-style suburban into the firestorm to save his daughter. This is one of the most action-movie type sequences in the book and Markley pulls it off with room to spare. The rising sea levels, the hurricanes, the dust storms. The fact that only a black woman republican president can get through an environmental legislation, which is then gutted because of a an eco-terrorist event. Actually, worse than gutted; it becomes a stealth delivery device allowing surveillance, suspension of habeas corpus and all sorts of vile acts in the name of democracy - all from a gay, good looking ex-military cowboy senator-cum-president who made all of his money in private security; The capitol is taken over by environmentalists. Like if Jan 6 had worked, but non-violent Burning Man. But then of course it gets uglier than ugly. The rise of an ultra right charismatic Christian leader who holds his gatherings in a a VR "Worlde" - these worldes are a big thing and most people are retreating into these alternate realities. And meanwhile, the weather just keeps getting hotter, more unpredictably disastrous and the seas keep rising. In the end, people sorta have to come around and he cobbles together what has to pass for a happy ending. But it's a mess. And honestly, the book reflects the messiness. It jumps narrators and at times, devolves into a pastiche of New Yorker articles, mindover asides, Congressional white papers, tabloid headlines ... but it all works. Some of the commentary on pop culture is even "lol." The stuff we fiddle with while the world burns. I'd say it's required reading. It's well-researched and has given my own personal views on the environment, technology, social and political behaviors and policies and the economic/financial fallout and ramifications for our "way of life" I only wish the near future dystopia painted in this brave book weren't all-too-plausible. As always, let's hope for the best, focus on what's good in people but be realistic and prepare for the worst. Here's the NY Times Review for a more professionalish take. It's been a bit since I've finished this. let's see what I can remember. "The Dutch actually founded New York. Did you know it was originally called New Amsterdam."
Not using exclamation points. Trying to keep my dignity. Take two, the write-up begins in earnest. Everyone knows that New York was originally New Amsterdam. But the premise of this well-researched book by Russell Shorto is that New York was "New York" way before it was English or certainly, American - briefly the capitol, actually and the seat of government when General Washington originally took office. Unlike the colonies founded by by the Puritans, New Amsterdam was always a diverse, unruly place of barter and quick deals, whores and bankers. And this is because it was founded by the Dutch who at this time were Europes only Republic and as an outpost of the Dutch West India company, New Amsterdam brought all of that along with it. I liked Russell Shorto's writing. I would definitely read something else by him. It's shocking that his book came out in 2004 - seems like a lifetime ago ... and for my kids and I, it kinda was. Anyway, the book is based on a lot of new research that was happening because of the work of Charles Gehring, the director of the New Netherland Project, devoted 30 years to translating the manuscript of Duth records of the New Netherland colony - that were all hard to read because they were in Middle Dutch or something like that. The dramatic tension of the book comes from the rivalry of Peter Stuyvesant, who we have all heard of, and Adriaen Van der Donck, who none of us have heard of. Peter Stuyvesant was the authoritative Governor of the New Netherland Colony. Adriaen Van der Donck was a young Junker (landed gentleman) who had gone to school at Leiden, and studied law. He was an advocate of the people and of making New Netherland a free colony with the citizens enjoying full rights of the Dutch people back home, and not just an trading outpost for the Dutch West India company. He even went back to Holland to plead his case before the council at Den Hague. Things were looking good, too, but then William II, Stadtholder, a sort of honorific King, decided he'd had enough republicanism for awhile and set 10,000 troops to take over Amsterdam and Van der Donck's case was pushed aside. Van der Donck also wrote an account of the plants and people of the new world, which would have probably been revered as a classic if written in English; instead it has been sort of buried under the silt of time. Here's the wiki page if you want to know more. Giving it a once over, I think it's mostly taken from Shorto's book - so good for him. Russell Shorto does a great job of drawing out the characters - I imagine from pretty slim pickings. Gets a little dry in the middle, but closes strong. I just read a really mean-spirited review of this book by a very critical critic. Personally, I don't think I could ever rip apart something that someone had put so much energy into - something that had so much of a person's actual biography in it, and therefore truth; something created by a writer with so much native talent, and the will & energy to bring solid working structure - if not quite traditional to bear. There are portraits of people (Any of the Rude family) and sketches of time periods (Brooklyn before "gentification" - the birth of rap, graffiti and tagging, punk rock in New York, and the crack epidemic - that are worth the price admission.
Nevertheless ... I totally get it. I can do without people peppering their reviews with F bombs in the name of some sort of credibility, but yeah. I can totally understand why someone who's not me would be annoyed this book. You don't have the same cultural mile-markers. You didn't have to clean dogshit off of some big kids shoe just because you were white. You didn't have a religious experience the first time you heard the new york dolls. I'm assuming you don't spend your youth on an unsupervised, drug spiral. Honestly, it's tough for me to understand anyone else actually liking this book besides me. It's not for you. This book is like the conversations I have with my wife. It's almost like we were together growing up because we're the exactly the same age - we remember the same music, shows, cultural events - it's just that she was in Texas and I was in Seattle. Same way with this thinly-veiled biographical novel. It's almost like Jonathan Lethem wrote this book to say "This is what it would have been like growing up in Brooklyn, Max." Though exaggerated, the parallels were numerous - in particular around race. In the book, Dylan Edbus is the only white kid at his pre-gentrified Brooklyn school. I wasn't the only white kid at Montlake Elementary, or at Madrona, or at Meany, but my class was the first to be bussed to a black neighborhood. It was awkward and sometimes violent. To make things more conflicted, his best friend, Mingus Rude, is the son of a black, down-on-his-luck, freebasing musician and a white woman. My best friend in elementary school was my 1/2 black cousin Morgan. Our feelings around race are mixed, with getting bullied for being white but at the same time, this is a huge part of our identity, Dylan's through the music and graffiti culture, mine through basketball. My relationship with race complicated - very much like the portrait in the book. I still have some internal scars but it's also part of my identity and I'm proud of where I came from and I'm grateful for what I believe in is understanding of black America I have from growing up where I did. But I don't glamorize or idealize anything. Dylan is precociously smart and escaped his public school neighborhood to feel very out of place at an academic high school, Stuyvesant. Instead of going to Garfield, I went to Seattle Prep where I was a National Merit Scholar, and felt very out of place amongst all the kids from the suburbs. Drugs are a big part of the Dylan Edbus and Mingus Rude story. Drugs and alcohol were a big part of the Max and Morgan story. Morgan is dead now. I'm in recovery, so ... not dead. There is a bit of comic book magic in the book which some of the reviewers find off-putting. I find thematical correct and idk, why the heck not. I was never into comic books. More into Narnia and the Lord of the Rings. But I'm still taking that damn ring to Mordor, like it or not. Anyway. I know this doesn't seem much like a real review but I'll leave that to someone else who can write that better. Because I can write my own experience better. I will say that Generation X, as a cultural blip, is fascinating for me to revisit, now that we're closing in on the end of the story and becoming more and more of a an endangered species. So many of my friends are gone now, victims of depression, self-abuse, drugs and alcohol. I wear my self-loathing with pride, distorted guitars, distressed type and all. We had our moment. It was as beautiful clear and shining as a Tom Verlaine solo. And I'm glad for this portrait of what was going on in Brooklyn that answers the question - what would it have been like for me? ps. And as for the reviews that talk about how there are no responsible adults in this book, and it can't be a coming-of-age book because no one grows up ... sorry kiddo we don't measure up. Guess you had to be there. I opened this book with some trepidation, almost annoyance. Here comes another tome to legitimize a pod-guru's personal brand. Just give me the Cliff notes, I thought. But what I didn't anticipate was how interesting the background science would be. Dr. Attia begins by saying that other people that claim people can actually live longer is selling a line of goods. Mostly snake oil. The way that our cells break down, no one is going to be living to 200 or whatever. What he's really interested in is not longevity per say, but the quality of your life while you're living it. What he's talking about is Healthspan vs. Lifesapan. He even has a helpful graph that shows with a x-axis line that stays more bulbously elevated for longer with a steep drop off that visually describes the goal of keeping your mental faculties and physical mobility for longer.
The other theme he seeds early on is medicine 2.0 vs. 3.0 with medicine 2.0 basically treating the sickness and prolonging a life of misery, while "medicine 3.0" gets ahead of the game and is healthy based and preventive. Thinks ahead, rather than forecast, it back-casts - what do you want the last ten years of your life to look like? In a catching chapter in which they analyze the habits and DNA of a collection of people that reached their 100th year, he asks, what does it take to win the Centenarian Olympics? How do we avoid what he calls the four horsemen - Diabetes, Heart Disease, Cancer and Dementia and - the four things that Centenarians seem to be able to put off for 10, 20 years or in fact, avoid altogether. And then he goes into each of the four horsemen, chapter by chapter. But they're basically all related. In fact, having messed up blood glucose due to ingesting too much fructose not only directly to type two diabetes, it contributes to heart disease, cancer and dementia. He told the story of doing an operation where a guy that didn't drink still had a fatty liver on the verge of cirrhosis - basically because he drank 10 cokes a day. He really breaks down how our modern diet is to sugar heavy, and our bodies don't know what to do with it. We need to have sub-cutaneous fat, but when those reserves are full, the body starts storing fat elsewhere. And when it gets trained to do that, Type 2 Diabetes. Interestingly, it's a little more complicated than "eating fat" = fat in my blood. "good" cholesterol v "bad" cholesterol. It's more about training your body to burn fat. An Immense World, How Animal Senses Reveal the Hidden Realms Around Us. In a sentence, this book is a sense by sense exploration of how animals sense the world differently than us. Sight, smell, feel, taste, electrosense, magnet-sense, etc. For example, we all know that dogs hear better than us. And that eagles see better than us. But it's not that simple. What the author does is break down every animals world view into a specific "Umwelt" or how they apprehend the world. There are chapters devoted to Smells and Tastes, Light, Pain, Head, Contact and Flow, Surface Vibrations, Sound, Echoes, Electric Fields, Magnetic Fields, Uniting the Senses. Scallops have little eyes all around the outside of their shells that sense light. Butterflies can taste the things they land on with their feet. Catfish can taste the water around them with their skin. A chameleon's eyes move independently so it can see forward and back - and plenty of animals see different parts of the light spectrum than we do. In fact, many have ultraviolet markings that we can't see - like hummingbirds. Bats can sense the infrared heat emanating from warm bodies, and of course use echolocation to hunt. Otters and seals use their whiskers to sense the water-trails of fish and can track prey even when blinded - as can the bumps on an alligator's snout. Elephants can identify the tread of familiar elephants through the pads of their feet. Whales can communicate using low-pitched infrasonic calls. It's conjectured that in quieter times, they could communicate across entire oceans. And it's not just that some animals have different seeing or smelling or taste than we do - they have entirely different senses that we don't - like echolocation, and migrating birds can sense the the earth's magnetic fields - and we're not even sure how. Loggerhead turtles can do this, too. Many insects and birds communicated with sounds we can't hear or - this was an ear-opener - through the vibrations of plants leaves. They can communicate with potential mates, or feel the approach of chewing prey. Some animals are insensitive to cold so that they can hibernate all winter and the naked mole rat doesn't feel burn from the chemical that makes chilis hot. This one made me appreciate what it means to share our planet with animals. And made me rethink what it means to be human. That sounds a bit dramatic, and it wasn't like a complete 180 degree change in my thinking - but it reinforced much of what I already felt and taught me many new specifics. I guess every book changes your life just a little. But this one can change your life for good, and for the good. There isn't a day when I don't think about what I learned from this book and how it opened my senses to a more open and nuanced way of perceiving the world around me. As I ride my bike along Highland, I feel the wind on my skin - the coldness and the breeze. I hear the wind in the trees and birds. If it's dark - as it is at this time of year, I'm ware of the lights and distance sounds of traffic and trains. I think about how those noises affect the animals that I can't see, driving them further into darkness. I think about it when I'm running or riding my bike in the pre-dawn darkness - when I see the deer, rabbits and the occasional fox gliding silently in the distance. And finally, I think about it a lot when I'm writing about my time sailing with my father, and all the senses that go into boat racing - sight, sound, feel and most importantly the feel of the boat under me, which is a combination of balance, proprioception and the feel of motion and micro-impacts of wave action and the tug of wind and current – proprioception, I term I've been introduced to by doing yoga with my online teacher, Flo Niedheimer, of Breathe and Flow. This book taught me about senses I don't have an expanded the imagination. And it made me more thoughtful about the senses that I do have. I went out to see my mother recently - she has dementia now, and she always had some neurological quirks - left-right problems, and prone to malapropisms. Watch out for the presbyterian in the crosswalk, that kinda stuff. But I was about to take the learning from this book and apply it to the fact that she was able to helm a dragon class racing sailboat for years - because she rode horses. The connection to the sailboat was the same - a feel thing that transcended logic and what we think of as the normal senses. It was a good moment, to watch her light up. I've just been on a winning streak when it comes to Nature books lately. This book was inspiring at a number of depths. One, it was just really well written - some excellent turns of phrase, full of mellowed and mature pacing and alliteration. He doesn't lay it on too distractingly quick from cover-to-cover, but here's how it starts:
The way into the underland is through the riven trunk of an old ash tree. Late-summer heatwave, heavy air. Bees browsing drowsy over meadow grass. Gold of standing corn, green of fresh hay-rows, black of rooks on stubble fields. Somewhere down on lower ground an unseen fire is burning, its smoke a column. A child drips stones one by one into a metal bucket, ting, ting, ting. Follow a path through fields, past a hill to the east that is marked by a line of nine round burial barrows, nubbing the land like the bones of a spine. Three horses in a glinting cloud of flies, stock-still but for the swish of a tail, the twitch of a head. Over a stile in a limestone wall and along a stream to a thicketed dip from which grows the ancient ash. It's crown flourishes skywards into weather. It's long boughs lean low around. Its roots reach far underground. Swallows curve and dart, feathers flashing. Martins criss-cross the middle air. A swan flies high and south on creaking wings. This upper world is very beautiful. Near the ash's base it's trunk splits into a rough rift, just wide enough that a person might slip into the tree's hollow heart – and there drop into the dark space that opens below. The rift's edges are smoothed to a shine by those who have gone this way before, passing through the old ash to enter the underland. So, that's how it starts. And as you can probable judge from the title, the book is both a travel narrative and an exploration of ideas as well. The other enviable and admirable part of the book is that it's a personal adventure – without being wearily self-involved. He's a professor but a real Indiana Jones, in the sense that he goes caving and climbing and is reflective about it - as well as having the historical and literary recall to create deeply meaningful context. Thirdly, the book is admirable in it's message and purpose. He lays out the effects of the global warming and the Anthropocene in striking, emotionally impactful and let's face it - terrifying ways. Because it's effing well researched - you're seeing it through his eyes – and it's true. The book is broken up into three parts: Seeing (Britain), Hiding (Europe), and Haunting (The North). In the first part, the author takes us underground in the Mendips in Somerset in a journey back in time. "'Mendip is mining country ... it's also caving country. But above all it's burial country. There are hundreds of Bronze Age funeral barrows ... some joined with monuments and henges into large-scale ritual complexes. He then visits Boulby, Yorkshire to visit a deep Potash (used in fertilizers as a potassium source) mining site which stretches far out under the English Channel and houses a scientific lab here they can measure neutrinos. The last place he goes is Epping Forest, London for a meditation on the organic networks of fungus that connect forests. (This was also a theme in the Overstory.) In Part Two, Rob MacFarlane goes to Paris to explore the catecombs, to the Italy-Slovenia border near Trieste. This area is called the Karst Plateauwhere the limestone underland is filled with 10,000 caves and tunnels and even rivers such as the Timavo which is sort of a real-life Lethe – a starless river. The final section takes us to the Slovenian Highlands - to the Alpine border between Austria and Italy and Slovenia, which has caves that were embedded fortifications during WWI & WWII as well as sinkholes in the ground where people where thrown in, tortured and half-alive. Breathtaking atrocities. To turn Trumps phrase on it's head, "There were horrible people on both sides." The final section takes us North - to view caves with Neolithic Art, to the glaciers of Greenland and finally to a deep burial site for Nuclear Waste. The section where he solo hikes to the neolithic cave to see the red dancing figures on the walls – I won't forget the images for a long time. The wildness of the Norway Coast, the plastic trash bobbing in the water, the Maelstrom, and the Cave Itself. Neither will forget his descriptions of Greenland, with its immense yet receding glaciers to be traversed, the hiking on the Knud Rassmussen, the calving face of the glacier, the blue ice, the Moulin he repels into. I could see myself doing this/I would never do this. And finally, the visit to the burial site for nuclear waste - at first, it's all trepidation and condemnation, but there's a wonderful passage where he gets sympathetic and homely - the plastic chairs, the work that goes into it - people doing the best they can to protect the world and future generations. An ambitiously conceived project. Part travelogue and en exploration of what the underland means to us - as well as the traces we leave there. Highly recommended. The Invention of Nature - The Adventures of Alexander Von Humboldt - The Lost Hero of Science9/3/2023 I bought this book in Berlin at an English bookstore, St. George's Bookshop in Prenlauer Berg. I'm such a chameleon and of course, only draped in the colors of the latest book I've read, which is always the best ever, but this book really added depth and meaning and history to the things that I really care about. First of all, it's about a German, which added context to our trip. It's about the invention of the very idea of of the interconnectedness of being on planet earth, and traces the birth of the ecological and conservation movement from Alexander von Humboldt's journey through South America and the impact that his books had, through the people he influenced – with chapters devoted to Darwin, Thoreau, George Perkins March, Ernst Haeckel and finally John Muir.
Alexander von Humboldt was born on September 14, 1769 in Berlin. His family was well-to-do minor nobility. His older brother Wilhelm was famous in his own right as an educator and intellect – I'm sure I saw a statue of Wilhelm when I was in Berlin. As a young man, Alexander v H had the same struggles we hear about so often with families - particularly 19th century families, where the conservative sensible father wants his sons to get conservative, sensible jobs. And of course all AvH wanted to do was see the world. He was intrigued by news of the New World. But he stayed in school and applied himself and became an expert on geology and useful to the mining industry. He got an introduction to Goethe. Goethe was very into science and had his own theories. They would have long discussions. This was important because Goethe and Schiller to an extent had a big influence on AvH - his appreciation of Nature wasn't just intellectual, but poetic. So one of the premises of the book is that Alexander v Humboldt was the first popular science writer -– he didn't just write with his mind, but with his heart and gave birth to a whole new genre of writing. He was hugely popular in his day. The Humboldt Current was named after him, as well as - I assume - Humboldt county in California. At any rate, he excelled as a geologist and became well-known without academic circles but never gave up on his dream of traveling. In 1799, in the midst of the Napoleonic Wars, he was able to secure passage to South America, which at that time was pretty much completely colonized by Spain and closed to outsiders. Thus began a five year journey. I could give you the blow-by-blow but that's what the book and the online resources like this nice Encyclopedia Brittanica article are for. What I remember from reading most are the bugs. The traveling through different ecosystems - high desert with wild llamas, the rivers and forest and meeting the natives – and everywhere, bugs. As he travelled, his macro view of Nature began to take shape. Life is an interconnected web. Ecosystems are related, but consistent around the world. Going up in elevation is the same as going North. There was the observational part of the narrative as well as the sheer adventure of it all. He basically tracked through the Wilderness in two separate trips - the first time going up a river in Venezuela, I think, and proving it was connected to the Amazon watershed. Then he came back, went to Cuba, and then came back to South America and climbed the Andes. He climbed Chimborazo - an extinct volcano in Ecuador to a height of 19,286 in 1802 –without oxygen or any modern climbing equipment – he didn't reach the top but this remained the record for highest ascent for three decades. When he came back he spent the next quarter century making the rounds of the salons and publishing an incredible amount of books - making himself the most fashionable, emulated and influential scientist of the 19th century. His impact was polymathic. Social, scientific, artistic and cultural. I almost forgot to say that he was good friend with Simon Bolivar and had strong opinions about how the environment - and the natives - were treated by Colonialism (this was a big reason why he was never allowed to consummate his dream of visiting the Himalayas, because of the controlled paranoia of the British East Indian Co.) He observed. He drew. He measured everything. He sent letters and samples back. He discovered the equatorial line. He measured the magnetism from the poles. He discovered, first hand, altitude sickness. He measured the blue of the sky. And he wrote a thrilling narrative. Everyone read his work. The Romantic poets of course and mostly importantly, maybe, Darwin. He loved living in Paris, and always felt that science was a nation with no borders. When he returned to Berlin to be kept as a golden bird in a cage by the king, he suffered. Late in life he was allowed one last journey – he travelled across Russia to the Altai mountains. Most of of the Russia Steppe was repetitive, but he crossed into Mongolia, and was able to measure and observe and meet the Chinese at the border. At the end of the book, there are separate sections on those he influenced. Some we've heard of, some not so recognizable. Darwin. Thoreau. George Perkins March. Ernst Haeckel. And finally, John Muir. As the book went into these other sections, I felt a sense of loss. Is that all their is? But then each of these people were fascinating in their own right – and Andrea Wulf gives a stirring insightful narration of the impact of each as well as their relation and acknowledgement of the Humboldt in some of what they said and in all they did. Why is Humboldt sort of forgotten today? A big part of that is that he was German - and like Haeckels, his legacy was sullied and even tarnished by association with the Prussians and the Wehrmacht. In the end, I walked away with three things that I hope I never love. One, an appreciation for nature and a fascination with new vistas. Two, an for the never-ending adventure that is life - many of these guys just never slowed down but kept creating, learning, exploring. And finally, more context on the Belle Epoch and Art Nouveau - which I'm further fascinated by. |