In the 1760s a group of amateur experimenters met and made friends in the English Midlands. Most came from humble families, all lived far from the center of things, but they were young and their optimism was boundless: together they would change the world. Among them were the ambitious toymaker Matthew Boulton and his partner James Watt, of steam-engine fame; the potter Josiah Wedgwood; the larger-than-life Erasmus Darwin, physician, poet, inventor, and theorist of evolution (a forerunner of his grandson Charles). Later came Joseph Priestley, discoverer of oxygen and fighting radical....
In the 1760s a group of amateur experimenters met and made friends in the English Midlands. Most came from humble families, all lived far from the ...
Thomas Bewick's (1753-1828) History of British Birds was the first field guide for ordinary people, illustrated with woodcuts of astonishing accuracy and beauty. In Nature's Engraver, Jenny Uglow tells the story of the farmer's son from Tyneside who became one of Britain's greatest and most popular engravers. It is a story of violent change, radical politics, lost ways of life, and the beauty of the wild--a journey to the beginning of our lasting obsession with the natural world.
"A refined and engaging biography, as beautifully wrought, in its way, as Bewick's...
Thomas Bewick's (1753-1828) History of British Birds was the first field guide for ordinary people, illustrated with woodcuts of astonishing...
