Triumph And Tragedy In Mudville

Science meets sport in this vibrant collection of baseball essays but the late evolutionary biologist.

Stephen Jay Gould (1941-2002) was the Alexander Agassiz  Professor of Zoology and Professor of Geology at Harvard University and the curator for invertebrate palaeontology in the University's Museum of Comparative Zoology.  He is the author of over twenty books, and received the National Book Award, the National Book Critics Circle Award, and the MacArthur Fellowship.  He died in May 2002.

Among Stephen Jay Gould's many gifts was his ability to write eloquently about baseball, his great passion.  Through the years, the renowned palaeontologist published numerous essays on the sport which have now for the first time been collected in a volume alive with all the candour and insight that characterized Gould's writing.  Here are his thoughts on the complexities of childhood streetball and the joys of opening day; tributes to Mickey Mantle, Babe Ruth, and lesser-knowns such as deaf-mute centerfielder 'Dummy' Hoy; and a frank admission of the contradictions inherent in being a lifelong Yankees fan with Red Sox season tickets.  So, too, does Gould deftly apply the tools of evolutionary theory to the demise of the 0.400 hitter, the Abner Doubleday creation myth, and the improbability of Joe DiMaggio's 56-game hitting streak. This book is a delight - an essential addition to Gould's remarkable legacy, and a fitting tribute to his love for the game.

A Stephen Jay Gould Reader

The Richness of Life

An impressive and generous selection of the best and most representative writing by one of the best loved scientists and science writers.

This "best of Gould" collection leaves two strong impressions. One is that evolution is as proven a fact as gravity but that how it works is an unsolved problem. The other is that, for the practitioners, science is fun

Georgeously crafted essays... entertaining... makes a plausible case for supporting claims that the author was a modern-day Montaigne of science... a rewarding read

A Western Science phenomenon. His quirkiness, his ability to coalesce seemingly unconnected topics, and his individual passion are qualities that help make him such a powerful writer

The most readable of scientists. Whether linking the death of textile workers in New York with Darwin's theory of natural selection, or the sale of fake fossils in Morocco with an 18th-century paleontological hoax, Gould proves that he is a master bridge builder

One of the best essayists in the business. He uses his wide background knowledge (anything from baseball to the political history of revolutionary France) as a bridge to entice non-scientists into sharing the excitement of scientific discovery and the curious, convoluted path of new ideas through history

It is a hallmark of Stephen Jay Gould's craft, brilliant paleontologist that he is, to retrieve long-buried evidence from oblivion and breathe vibrant life into it, making fascinating connections between science and the human predicament... extraordinary

Stephen Jay Gould was the Alexander Agassiz Professor of Zoology and Professor of Geology at Harvard and the Curator for Invertebrate Palaeontology in the University's Museum of Comparative Zoology. He died in May 2002. 
 
Steven Rose is Professor of Biology and Director of the Brain and Behaviour Research Group at The Open University, Visiting Professor in the Department of Anatomy and Developmental Biology at University College London, and, jointly with sociologist Hilary Rose, Professor of Physic (genetics and society) at Gresham College, London. His books include The Making of Memory (1992), Lifelines (1997), Alas, Poor Darwin: Arguments Against Evolutionary Psychology (with Hilary Rose) (2000) and The 21st-Century Brain (2004). 
 
Paul McGarr is a mathematics teacher in an east London secondary school and a leading member of the Respect coalition in Tower Hamlets. He is on the editorial board of the International Socialism quarterly journal and has written regularly for that journal on issues around science and society. He has written a number of articles and books, including Marxism and the Great French Revolution (1992) and Mozart: Overture to Revolution (2001).

There aren't many scientists famous enough in their lifetime to be canonized by the US Congress as one of America's 'living legends'. Yet few would have grudged this accolade to Stephen Jay Gould, whose writings on history - both of the natural world and of the study of the natural world - had made him a household name by the time of his death in 2002. 
 
A committed Darwinian and robust critic of creationist myths, he nevertheless made major revisions to orthodox Darwinian theory, from his concept of punctuated equilibrium to his insistence on the importance of chance in the history of life on earth. And in addition, his trenchant attacks on scientific racism and the pretensions of sociobiology still resonate, nearly three decades after they were first written. 
 
In The Richness of Life, Steven Rose and Paul McGarr have selected from across the full range of Gould's writing, including some of the most famous of his essays and extracts from his major books. An introduction by Steven Rose sets both the essays, and Gould's life, in context.

Reflections in Natural History

Eight Little Piggies

This is the sixth in the great series of essays that the world's best science writer has produced. They range over a vast field, from history to the latest theories in biology, from controversies over palaeontology to the origins of language.

Remarkable... Gould takes his readers on tough-minded rambles across the visible surface of things... extraordinary

Gould has a talent for making the scientific, and particularly the revolutionary, interesting and striking

A lovely mixture of bizarre facts, nice arguments, clever insights into the workings of evolution and a quality of writing that can make your skin prickle... Gould has given us a feast

Rather than serving up his science cold, Gould invariably puts a spin on it, taking his readers down the innumerable byways of history, literature and personal anecdote along the route to his theoretical conclusions

Reading Gould is not merely a pleasure but an education and a chronicle of the times

One of the best essayists in the business. He uses his wide background knowledge as a bridge to entice non-scientists into sharing the excitement of scientific discovery and the curious, convoluted path of new ideas through history

Few writers of popular science have given more pelasure to more readers than Stephen Jay Gould...He packs a clout few science writers can match

Who could resist a title like that - and knowing the author, who wouldn't surmise that Gould...demonstrat{es} that five fingers and five toes are not the primordial/canonical mammalian standard...Essays that reveal Gould in midlife, as passionate and articulate as ever, but older and wiser

Like the master, Darwin, [Gould] has a gift for metaphor

Stephen Jay Gould was the Alexander Agassiz Professor of Zoology and Professor of geology at Harvard and the curator for invertebrate palaeontology in the university's Museum of Comparative Zoology. He died in May 2002.

No one illuminates the wonderful workings of the natural world as perceptively and enjoyably as Stephen Jay Gould. In this volume of reflections on biology, history and culture, Gould addresses the burning issues of ecological crisis and contemporary species extinctions as well as giving us fascinating insights into evolution - such as the fact that the first land vertebrates had up to eight toes on each foot, and that the ichthyosaur had a very significant kink in its tail.

The Spread of Excellence From Plato to Darwin

Life's Grandeur

'Reading Gould is not merely a pleasure but an education and a chronicle of the times' - Observer

A hard, even ruthless, completion of Darwinism which is, nevertheless, exhilarating and allows for future argument

Gould only enriches the texture of his writing with each successive phase-He would not be the great science writer that he is if he were not also a great humanist

Gould's depth and humanity fit him for Montaigne's mantle more plausibly that anyone else currently writing... Lucid, exciting, accessible

Stephen Jay Gould (1941-2002) was the Alexander Agassiz Professor of Zoology and Professor of Geology at Harvard University and the curator for invertebrate palaeontology in the University's Museum of Comparative Zoology. He is the author of over twenty books, and received the National Book Award, the National Book Critics Circle Award, and the MacArthur Fellowship. He died in May 2002.

In his characteristically iconoclastic and original way, Stephen Jay Gould argues that progress and increasing complexity are not inevitable features of the evolution of life on Earth. Further, if we wish to see grandeur in life, we must discard our selfish and anthropocentric view of evolution and learn to see it as Darwin did, as the random but unfathomably rich source of 'endless forms most beautiful and wonderful'. Any rational view of nature tells us that we are a simple branch on an immense bush; and that life on Earth is remarkable not for where it is leading, but for the fullness and constancy of its variety, ingenuity and diversity.

Mending and Minding the Misconceived Gap Between Science and the Humanities

The Hedgehog, The Fox And The Magister's Pox

The final book from the most celebrated popular science writer in the world.

Not only one of the finest scientific minds of the later twentieth century, but also one of its greatest polymaths

Gould strives to outline a more peaceful, mutually supportive view of the realtionship between the sciences and the humanities

One of the best essayists in the business. He uses his wide background knowledge...as a bridge to entice non-scientists into sharing the excitement of scientific discovery and the curious, convoluted path of new ideas through history

A fitting tribute to his career, as it combines, in both style and substance, the different themes of his life's work. Blending genuine literary talents with impeccable scientific credentials, Gould crafts an elegant entreaty for scientists and scholars to spend less time complaining about each other and more time combining their considerable resources. We need both the fox and the hedgehog in any intellectual menagerie - the persistent pluralist

Stephen Jay Gould was the Alexander Agassiz Professor of Zoology and professor of geology at Harvard and the curator for invertebrate palaeontology in the university's Museum of Comparative Zoology.  He died in May 2002.

Completed shortly before his death, this is the last work of science from the most celebrated popular science writer in the world. 
 
In characteristic form, Gould weaves the ideas of some of Western society's greatest thinkers, from Bacon to Galileo to E. O. Wilson, with the uncelebrated ideas of lesser-known yet pivotal intellectuals. He uses their ides to undo an assumption born in the seventeenth century and continuing to this day, that science and the humanities stand in opposition. Gould uses the metaphor of the hedgehog - who goes after one thing at a measured pace, systematically investigating all; the fox - skilled at many things, intuitive and fast; and the magister's pox - a censure from the Catholic Church involved in Galileo's downfall: to illustrate the different ways of responding to knowledge - in a scientific, humanistic or fearful way. He argues that in fact each would benefit by borrowing from the other.

Splashes and Reflections in Natural History

I Have Landed

'Matchless examples of the strengths of a historical imagination roaming across a scientific subject' Guardian

Gems of evolutionary and natural-history wisdom

Not only one of the finest scientific minds of the later 20th century, but also one of its greatest polymaths... A wonderfully eclectic collection-a fine introduction to a brilliant mind

It is hard to think of any one else with this combination of polymathic ability and of sheer cheek...original and controversial...quintessentially revealing

This is not a book for the bedside table. It sets the mind racing too wildly for sleep

High in emotion and rich in historical perspective-one of our most gifted and productive science writers... He pioneered an explosion in the popularisation of science but has never been bettered in the process

Stephen Jay Gould (1941-2002) was the Alexander Agassiz Professor of Zoology and Professor of Geology at Harvard University and the curator for invertebrate palaeontology in the University's Museum of Comparative Zoology. He is the author of over twenty books, and received the National Book Award, the National Book Critics Circle Award, and the MacArthur Fellowship.  He died in May 2002.

Stephen Jay Gould's writing remains the modern standard by which popular science writing is judged. Throughout his work Gould has developed a distinctive and personal form of essay to treat great scientific issues in the context of biography. With I Have Landed, Gould once again applied biographical perspectives to the illumination of key scientific concepts and their history. Ranging from the discovery of the new scourge of syphilis by Fracastero in the sixteenth century and Isabelle Duncan's nineteenth-century attempt at reconciling scripture and palaeontology to Freud's weird speculations about human phylogeny and recent creationist attacks on the study of evolution. As always, the essays brilliantly illuminate and elucidate the puzzles and paradoxes great and small that have fuelled the enterprise of science and opened our eyes to a world of unexpected wonders.

Rocks Of Ages

' Rocks of Ages is vintage, spell-binding Stephen Jay Gould, challenging, passionate and beguiling' The Times

Gould is at his brilliant best... A truly convincing performance

Convincingly argued and thought provoking-Gould must rank as one of the leading scientific essayists of his generation and, as ever, he is in total command of his subject matter. He steers a deft route through contentious waters, but manages to retain a humorous edge, that keeps the book both engaging and highly entertaining. Gould provides the literary magic to deliver a light-hearted read

Concise, eloquent and passionate. It is a marvellous work. Gould speaks clear, sound sense, and Rocks of Ages should be required reading not only for scientists and religious people, but for anybody who cares about the quest for meaning

This marvellous extended essay should have been the real lost book of the New Testament. Gould, arguably our greatest living popular science essayist, has many joyful enthusiasms. Among them are eternity, Charles Darwin and baseball-Gould has such insatiable and infectious enthusiasm for the intellectual challenge and fascination of being a mere speck in a vast universe

Rocks of Ages is easy and enjoyable to read. It contains many charming illustrations and interesting insights

Writing with characteristic bracing intelligence and clarity, Gould sheds new light on a dilemma that has plagued thinking people since the Renaissance. Instead of having to choose between science and religion, Gould asks, why not opt for the golden resolution that accords dignity and distinction to both? In elaborating and exploring his thought-provoking concept, Gould delves into the history of science with stories of figures as Galileo and Darwin, and concludes that science defines the natural world, and religion our moral world.

Penultimate Reflections in Natural History

The Lying Stones of Marrakech

'Gould's astonishing success as a populariser of science is the result of his writing ability and his massive learning' - Literary Review

Gould has an infectious and joyful understanding of the intricacies of his subject, be it an appreciation of Carl Sagan, the dangers of scientific fraud or a brief homage to Mozart. With Lying Stones we have one of our last chances to appreciate these virtues and assess a scientiest who has become a Western Science phenomenon. His quirkiness, his ability to coalesce seemingly unconnected topics, and his individual passion are qualities that help make him such a powerful writer

Stephen Jay Gould was the Alexander Agassiz Professor of Zoology and Professor of Geology at Harvard University, and the Vincent Astor Visiting Professor of Biology at New York University. During his illustrious career, his publications included Ever Since Darwin, Eight Little Piggies, Life's Grandeur, Questioning the Millenium, Leonardo's Mountain of Clams and the Diet of Worms, Bully for Brontosaurus and Wonderful Life. Wonderful Life won the Science Book Prize for 1991. Stephen Jay Gould died in 2002, aged 60.

Stephen Jay Gould's writing remains the modern standard by which popular science writing is judged. Ever since the late 1970s up until till his death in 2002, his monthly essay in Natural History and his full-length books bridged the yawning gap between science and wider culture. 
 
In this fascinating new collection of essays from Natural History, Gould applied biographical perspectives to the illumination of key scientific concepts and their history, ranging from the origins of palaeontology to modern eugenics and genetic engineering. The essays brilliantly illuminate and elucidate the puzzles and paradoxes great and small that have fuelled the enterprise of science and opened our eyes to a world of unexpected wonders.

Wonderful Life

A controversial enquiry into the fundamental principles of evolutionary theory from an award-winning writer

A masterpiece of analysis and imagination...It centres on a sensational discovery in the field of palaeontology - the existence, in the Burgess Shale... of 530-million-year-old fossils unique in age, preservation and diversity...With skill and passion, Gould takes this mute collection of fossils and makes them speak to us.  The result challenges some of our most cherished self-perceptions and urges a fundamental re-assessment of our place in the history of life on earth

High in the Canadian Rockies is a small limestone quarry formed 530 million years ago. Called the Burgess Shale, it holds the remains of an ancient sea where dozens of strange creatures lived - a forgotten corner of evolution preserved in incredible detail. In this book Stephen Jay Gould explores what the Burgess Shale might tell us about evolution and the nature of history. 
 
The Darwinian theory of evolution is a well-known, well-explored area. But there is one aspect of human life which this theory of evolution fails to account for: chance. Using the brilliantly preserved fossil fauna of the Burgess Shale as his case study, Gould argues that chance was in fact one of the decisive factors in the evolution of life on this planet, and that, with a flip of coin, everything could have been very different indeed.

Questioning The Millennium

The approach of the millenium elicits all those responses in Stephen Jay Gould which make him today's finest spokesman for the joys of science. The rationalist in him is horrified yet fascinated by the tradition of "Apocalypse soon" prophecies...What is clear from this splendid book - crisp, clever and chirpy as ever - is that Stephen Jay Gould will go down as one of the real turns of the century.

Questioning the Millenium tackles our eternal fascination with round-numbered years from a whole range of historical, philosophical and scientific viewpoints...If you are going to buy one millennial stocking filler, but this one.

Gould not only enriches the texture of his writing with each successive phase...He would not be the great science writer that he is if he were not also a great humanist.

Gould's personal interest is as exuberant and authentic as ever, and one good reason for it is offered by an epilogue which both fascinates and touches, and is best left as a surprise.

Stephen Jay Gould is the Alexander Agassiz Professor of Zoology and Professor of Geology at Harvard University, and the Curator for Invertebrate Palaeontology in the University's Museum of Comparative Zoology. His publications include Eight Little Piggies, Wonderful Life, Ever Since Darwin, The Panda's Thumb, Dinosaur in a Haystack and, most recently, Life's Grandeur.

Stephen Jay Gould examines the phenomenon of the millennium. He looks at the origins of the term in the Biblical prophecies of the Book of Revelation - if the six ages of man date from 4000BC, will 2000AD signify the end of time? Gould describes how the meaning of the word has evolved to its present day usage and tackles the debate over whether the millennium ends in 1999 or at the end of 2000AD. He also questions the human compulsion to impose our time-schemes on the universe and wonders how far can we go in applying our mathematical principles to nature. Existing methods of calculating time are all flawed to some extent and yet the complexities of lunar months, leap years, and the calculation of dates such as Easter, are part and parcel of our fascination with calendrics as both a hobby and an occupation.

Stephen Jay Gould

Stephen Jay Gould's writing remains the modern standard by which popular science writing is judged. Ever since the last 1970s, his monthly essay in Natural History and his full-length books have bridged the yawning gap between science and the wider culture. This fascinating new collection of essays contains some of Gould's best writing on a variety of subjects ranging from Leonardo da Vinci and Martin Luther to fossils and the history of science. As always, these essays brilliantly display his gift for colloquial and vivid explanation, and include fascinating oddities from the natural world and the printed word.

Stephen Jay Gould

Books by Stephen Jay Gould

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