Pilgrim on the Great Bird Continent: The Importance of Everything and Other Lessons from Darwin's Lost Notebooks.

PILGRIM ON THE GREAT BIRD CONTINENT: The Importance of Everything and Other Lessons from Darwin's Lost Notebooks LYANDA LYNN HAUPT

Charles Darwin's exploits during his voyage on the HMS Beagle in 1831 were the impetus of his revolutionary theories on natural selection and evolution. At the trip's outset, Darwin was a youth with merely a passing interest in natural history, traveling for an adventure. Five years later, at the voyage's end, Darwin was a man with ideas that would forever alter scientific and popular notions of the natural world, in this book, nature writer Haupt examines Darwin's publications and lesser-known journals for clues to his dramatic transformation. They show, for instance, that Darwin gleaned a great deal of insight from his observations of birdlife other than the famous Galapagos finches. His Ornithological Notes reveals not only Darwin's sensitivity to the minute details of the observable world but also his modesty and zeal for learning. Little, Brown, 2006, 288 p., hardcover, $24.95.