Description
Book SynopsisParis at the time of the French Revolution was the world capital of science. Its scholars laid the foundations of today''s physics, chemistry and biology. They were true revolutionaries: agents of an upheaval both of understanding and of politics.
Many had an astonishing breadth of talents. The Minister of Finance just before the upheaval did research on crystals and the spread of animal disease. After it, Paris''s first mayor was an astronomer, the general who fought off invaders was a mathematician while Marat, a major figure in the Terror, saw himself as a leading physicist. Paris in the century around 1789 saw the first lightning conductor, the first flight, the first estimate of the speed of light and the invention of the tin can and the stethoscope. The metre replaced the yard and the theory of evolution came into being.
The city was saturated in science and many of its monuments still are. The Eiffel Tower, built to celebrate the Revolution''s centennial, saw the worl
Trade Review
An ingenious guidebook to the scientific past of Paris, written in lucid, erudite prose -- Ruth Scurr * New Statesman *
Every section provides a richly informative guide to the history of a different scientific subject - from evolution to the rise of the potato * Daily Mail *
A wonderful read * Guardian *
Jones makes his mark as a popular science historian * New Scientist *
[An] erudite mixture of science and history . . . a wide-ranging look at the discoveries of the era * Publishers Weekly *
The outcomes are never what anyone could have guessed, and watching Jones unfurl them is spellbinding -- Peter Carey * Sunday Times *
Jones is an excellent writer of popular science, but he is also able to cross over seamlessly into lucid discussions of culture and history * Mail on Sunday *
