Description
Book SynopsisTrade Review"Fast-paced, snappy and suspenseful."--Emmanuelle Smith"Financial Times" (12/18/2009) "A scrupulously researched and well-told narrative."--Miranda Weiss"American Scholar" (01/01/2010) "If you want a shot of environmental patriotism, this book is a good choice."--Sierra Club "A fascinating and very readable account of a controversial natural history issue in early nineteenth century America."--Choice (04/01/2010) "For those of us who think that science is international, Lee Alan Dukatin's Mr. Jefferson and the Giant Moose will come as a shock. In this case it was anything but. It was the French against the Americans, Georges-Louis Leclerc de Buffon versus Thomas Jefferson, in a dispute over the relative degree of degeneracy exhibited by the flora and fauna of the Old and New Worlds. According to Buffon, American plants and animals, including native Americans, are merely degenerate versions of European forms. Jefferson attempted to counter this Eurocentric chauvinism by displaying an American moose that was larger than any of the European ungulates--the giant moose in the title of this fascinating book."--David Hull --David Hull "This fascinating book combines a deep knowledge of biology with a love of American history to tell a story that grips like a thriller. Lee Alan Dugatkin introduces you to Thomas Jefferson and the giant moose, an animal so great and imposing that never again could the belittling naturalists of Europe assume that American natural life was inferior. Sparkling on the surface, profound beneath the waters, this is a book that will be happy reading for people of all interests and ages."--Michael Ruse, author of Darwinism and Its Discontents --Michael Ruse
