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An engaging account of the life and work of the legendary polymath Alexander von Humboldt.
In this lucid biography, Andreas Daum offers a succinct and novel interpretation of the life and oeuvre of Alexander von Humboldt (1769–1859). A Prussian nobleman born into the age of European Enlightenment, Humboldt was a contemporary of Napoleon, Simon Bolivar, and Charles Darwin. As a naturalist and scholar, he travelled the world, from the Americas to Central Asia, and recorded his observations in multiple volumes. Humboldt is still admired today for his interdisciplinary outreach and ecological awareness.
Moving beyond the conventional views of Humboldt as either an intellectual superhero or a gentleman colonizer, Daum's account presents a novel interpretation. His incisive account focuses on Humboldt in the context of the tumultuous period of history in which he lived. Humboldt embodied the contradictions that marked the age of Atlantic Revolutions. He became a critic of slavery and embraced the emerging civil society but remained close to authoritarian rulers. He dedicated his life to scientific research yet was driven by emotional impulses and pleaded for an aesthetic appreciation of nature. Daum introduces a man passionately striving to establish a "cosmic" understanding of nature while grappling with the era's explosion of knowledge.
This book provides the first concise biography of Humboldt, covering all periods of his life, exploring his personality, the vast range of his works, and his intellectual networks. Daum helps us understand Humboldt as a seminal historical figure and illuminates the role of science at the dawn of the global world.
Andreas Daum is professor of history at the State University of New York (SUNY) at Buffalo and a recipient of the Humboldt Research Award. He is the author of Kennedy in Berlin, Emigres from Nazi Germany as Historians, and Popularizing Science in the Nineteenth Century (in German), among others.
"Andreas Daum has distilled his deep knowledge of Alexander von Humboldt into a short, very readable biography. His nuanced account does full justice to a complex, multifaceted figure. The author elegantly weaves together life and times in a book that is scholarly and engrossing. The different phases of a long life are expertly managed, there is generous direct quotation, and Daum's arguments are both fresh and convincing. I recommend the book highly as the perfect introduction to its complex subject."
– David Blackbourn, author of The Conquest of Nature and Germany in the World: A Global History, 1500–2000
"At the time of his death in 1859, Alexander von Humboldt was a global celebrity as a paragon of scientific travel, a master of several disciplines, and an inveterate intellectual networker across Europe and the Atlantic. Avoiding both hero worship and debunking, Andreas Daum succeeds in capturing the many facets of this paradoxical man. A marvel of concision and readability."
– Jürgen Osterhammel, author of Unfabling the East and The Transformation of the Worl
d"This book offers a well written and accessible account of Alexander von Humboldt's life, times, and significance. Andreas Daum admirably succeeds in offering a beautifully even-handed and well-documented biography of an enduring hero in the natural sciences."
– Nicolaas A. Rupke, Washington and Lee University
"Andreas Daum describes Alexander von Humboldt not only as an ingenious polymath, indefatigable traveler and enlightened philanthropist, but also a representative of his time. This masterly biography is an expanded version of the German original – extraordinarily knowledgeable, based on the latest state of research, elegantly written – and brilliantly translated."
– Barbara Stollberg-Rilinger, author of Maria Theresa: The Habsburg Empress in Her Time
