Ever since some years ago receiving for review a short, popularly directed biography of Charles Darwin penned by a very well-known and long respected historian that upon reading I found to be so… well, let’s just say that there is a very valid reason I shall never print the name of the book itself or ever again that of the author in The Well-read Naturalist, I have become particularly ill at ease whenever I now receive any manner of biography written about Mr. Darwin.
Such was once again the case when I recently slid a copy of a newly published biography of him from out of its just-arrived package.
However, as I have, given my long experience of reviewing their consistently well-researched and well-written publications, a very high level of personal as well as professional respect for the editorial staff of both Reaktion Books and the University of Chicago Press (the book’s publisher and partnered US distributor, respectfully), as its author has such a long history of significant publications pertaining to the life and work of Mr. Darwin, and as the book has already received high praise from such noted authorities as Prof. John van Wyhe, the illness of my ease was quickly remedied and I shall be taking up Dr. J. David Archibald’s new Critical Lives: Charles Darwin – the most recent addition to the Reaktion Critical Lives series of books that already includes Dr. Samantha Rose Hill on Hannah Arendt, which by itself tells me that the series is worth exploring further – for a reading very soon with both enthusiasm and high expectations indeed.
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