Darwin's Orchestra by Michael Sims, Henry Holt and Company, $30.00, 508 pages.
The News & Observer
June 22, 1997
Whimsical essays on science and nature
By Phillip Manning
In this hype-saturated age, nonfiction books often promise better
sex or more money or something equally desirable to entice us
to buy. Even science books -- normally a modest genre -- are caught
up in this avalanche. It's no longer enough for a book to simply
impart knowledge. Nowadays, it must be BIG knowledge, the kind
that will save your life or at least allow you to impress your
friends. Consequently, it's rare to run into a science book that
promises nothing but the rarest commodity of all -- a good read.
"Darwin's Orchestra" is that. It's also quirky, nicely
written, and full of gossipy tidbits. Where else can you find
out that Vladimir Nabokov once proved "with diagrams, no
less -- that the insect in Kafka's 'Metamorphosis' could not have
possibly been a cockroach." Or that the tiny island of Nauru
has "the highest income per capita of any nation in the Pacific."
Or that source of its wealth is guano.
The book is composed of 366 short essays, one for every day of
the year. Each essay commemorates an event that illustrates the
role nature (or science) has played in history and the arts. But
the author stretches the definition of "nature." Rousseau's
cats are here, as is the story of the famously inaccurate rhinoceros
sketched by Durer in 1515. P.T. Barnum's fake mermaid gets as
much space as Martha, the last passenger pigeon; and the "Big
Bang" theory rubs shoulders with the Piltdown Man hoax. Author
Michael Sims justifies their inclusion by quoting from Humpty-Dumpty:
"Whenever I make a word do a lot of extra work like that,
I always pay it extra." The author clearly owes "nature"
overtime wages.
Nevertheless, nature has played an important role in history and
the arts. The essay for February 29 is an example. In 1503, Christopher
Columbus beached his ships on Jamaica for repairs. The Spaniards
depended on the natives for food, but after sponging off them
for months, relations had soured. Without provisions, Columbus
and his men could not leave, and the natives were growing more
irate. Columbus consulted his astronomy book. He told the natives
that the Lord was angry with them for not providing food, and
that God would show his disapproval "on the face of the rising
moon." On the following night, the natives stormed the Spaniards'
ships, not with weapons but with food. Columbus and his men were
saved -- thanks to a lunar eclipse.
Another essay shows how nature influenced literature. "I
didn't like spiders at first," writes E.B White, "but
then I began watching one of them and soon saw what a wonderful
creature she was and what a skillful weaver." The result
of White's study was "Charlotte's Web," a children's
classic that is still a staple in bookstores nearly 50 years after
its publication. According to the author, White's fascination
with spiders lasted all his life. "When I get sick of what
men do," White wrote, "I have only to walk a few steps
in another direction to see what spiders do . . . This sustains
me very well indeed."
Pablo Picasso's interest in nature began at the age of nine, when
he began sketching doves. "Picasso kept doves at several
of his villas," the author writes, "and the birds appeared
in [his] works throughout his life." The essay for April
19 commemorates the 1949 opening of the World Peace Conference.
The organizers selected one of Picasso's dove sketches for the
poster advertising the conference. This image, the so-called "Dove
of Peace," became so famous that it is a cliché',
adorning everything from record-album covers to dorm-room walls.
Picasso's fondness for doves didn't stop with his art; he named
his daughter Paloma, the Spanish word for "dove."
The blending of nature, science, history, and the arts reaches
its whimsical peak in the essay from which the book takes its
title. Although Darwin is best known for his theory of evolution,
he spent his last years studying earthworms. To see how these
creatures reacted to music, Darwin assembled a family orchestra.
"Son Francis played a bassoon, grandson Bernard blew a whistle,
and wife Emma played the piano. The audience barely reacted, but
Darwin's little orchestra is remembered as one of the more amusing
experiments in the history of science."
Surprisingly, Darwin's work on earthworms turned out to be valuable,
showing how worms build and maintain the topsoil that is critical
to life. Or perhaps it's not surprising; as Vladimir Nabokov says
in another essay, "There is no science without fancy, and
no art without facts."
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