Looking for the first time at the cut-price anatomy schools rather than genteel Oxbridge, Desmond winkles out pre-Darwinian evolutionary ideas in reform-minded and politically charged early nineteenth-century London. In the process, he reveals the underside of London intellectual and social life in the generation before Darwin as it has never been seen before.
""The Politics of Evolution" is intellectual dynamite, and certainly one of the most important books in the history of science published during the past decade." Jim Secord, "Times Literary Supplement"
"One of those rare books...

Adrian Desmond and James Moore's gripping narrative reveals the great personal cost to Darwin of pursuing inflammatory truths--telling the whole story of how he came to his epoch-making conclusions

Dov Ospovat's book, originally published in 1981, has become generally accepted as one of the most influential books about Darwin published in recent years. Ospovat examines the period of 1838-1859, two decades preceding the publication of On the Origin of Species, in detail and shows that Darwin's views changed quite radically from initially believing that animals and plants were perfectly adapted to their environments, and that evolution only occurred when the environment changed, to believing that living things were not perfectly adapted, were in constant competition with each other, and...