Darwin’s two iconic years rendered masterfully by a highly knowledgeable chronicler.
A deeply satisfying new account of two crucial years in Darwin’s life.
Science historian Markel, author of The Secret of Life, The Kelloggs, and An Anatomy of Addiction, illuminates a short period beginning in 1858, when the 48-year-old naturalist suddenly realized that he needed to get his act together. An obscure researcher, Alfred Russel Wallace, had mailed Darwin a paper proposing that species evolved, thrived, or vanished according to their success in obtaining limited resources such as food. (For more on Wallace, turn to James T. Costa’s Radical by Nature.) This “struggle for existence,” wildly controversial because divine creation was not involved, had preoccupied Darwin for 20 years. Too squeamish to follow tradition—i.e., dump Wallace’s article and quickly publish his own—Darwin took the advice of friends and submitted Wallace’s paper, along with one of his own, to a local scientific society. They produced little controversy, but Darwin immediately set to work writing On the Origin of Species, “a book that would change the world.” In the final 200 pages of Markel’s book, the author delivers an entertaining account of Origin’s initial reception upon publication in 1859. Friends wrote enthusiastic reviews, while opponents wrote nasty ones; all of the criticism appeared anonymously, but the critics’ identities were usually not a secret. Darwin either agonized or rejoiced, and his recurrent digestive upsets became crippling. Historians tend to dismiss them as hypochondria, but Markel, a physician, concludes that Darwin “most likely suffered from systemic lactose intolerance.” The author concludes with the epic June 1860 Oxford meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science. Many historians have argued that pugnacious Darwin defender Thomas Huxley crushed anti-Darwinist Samuel Wilberforce. Examining contemporary accounts, Markel intriguingly wonders if this may be a case of history-by-the-winners because both pro- and anti-Darwinists claimed victory.
Darwin’s two iconic years rendered masterfully by a highly knowledgeable chronicler.Pub Date: June 11, 2024
ISBN: 9781324036746
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Norton
Review Posted Online: March 20, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2024
It’s not Shakespeare, not by a long shot. But at least it’s not James Franco.
A noted actor turns to verse: “Poems are a Saturday in the middle of the week.”
McConaughey, author of the gracefully written memoir Greenlights, has been writing poems since his teens, closing with one “written in an Australian bathtub” that reads just as a poem by an 18-year-old (Rimbaud excepted) should read: “Ignorant minds of the fortunate man / Blind of the fate shaping every land.” McConaughey is fearless in his commitment to the rhyme, no matter how slight the result (“Oops, took a quick peek at the sky before I got my glasses, / now I can’t see shit, sure hope this passes”). And, sad to say, the slight is what is most on display throughout, punctuated by some odd koanlike aperçus: “Eating all we can / at the all-we-can-eat buffet, / gives us a 3.8 education / and a 4.2 GPA.” “Never give up your right to do the next right thing. This is how we find our way home.” “Memory never forgets. Even though we do.” The prayer portion of the program is deeply felt, but it’s just as sentimental; only when he writes of life-changing events—a court appearance to file a restraining order against a stalker, his decision to quit smoking weed—do we catch a glimpse of the effortlessly fluent, effortlessly charming McConaughey as exemplified by the David Wooderson (“alright, alright, alright”) of Dazed and Confused. The rest is mostly a soufflé in verse. McConaughey’s heart is very clearly in the right place, but on the whole the book suggests an old saw: Don’t give up your day job.
It’s not Shakespeare, not by a long shot. But at least it’s not James Franco.Pub Date: Sept. 16, 2025
ISBN: 9781984862105
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Aug. 15, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
A blissfully vicarious, heartfelt glimpse into the life of a Manhattan burlesque dancer.
A former New York City dancer reflects on her zesty heyday in the 1970s.
Discovered on a Manhattan street in 2020 and introduced on Stanton’s Humans of New York Instagram page, Johnson, then 76, shares her dynamic history as a “fiercely independent” Black burlesque dancer who used the stage name Tanqueray and became a celebrated fixture in midtown adult theaters. “I was the only black girl making white girl money,” she boasts, telling a vibrant story about sex and struggle in a bygone era. Frank and unapologetic, Johnson vividly captures aspects of her former life as a stage seductress shimmying to blues tracks during 18-minute sets or sewing lingerie for plus-sized dancers. Though her work was far from the Broadway shows she dreamed about, it eventually became all about the nightly hustle to simply survive. Her anecdotes are humorous, heartfelt, and supremely captivating, recounted with the passion of a true survivor and the acerbic wit of a weathered, street-wise New Yorker. She shares stories of growing up in an abusive household in Albany in the 1940s, a teenage pregnancy, and prison time for robbery as nonchalantly as she recalls selling rhinestone G-strings to prostitutes to make them sparkle in the headlights of passing cars. Complemented by an array of revealing personal photographs, the narrative alternates between heartfelt nostalgia about the seedier side of Manhattan’s go-go scene and funny quips about her unconventional stage performances. Encounters with a variety of hardworking dancers, drag queens, and pimps, plus an account of the complexities of a first love with a drug-addled hustler, fill out the memoir with personality and candor. With a narrative assist from Stanton, the result is a consistently titillating and often moving story of human struggle as well as an insider glimpse into the days when Times Square was considered the Big Apple’s gloriously unpolished underbelly. The book also includes Yee’s lush watercolor illustrations.
A blissfully vicarious, heartfelt glimpse into the life of a Manhattan burlesque dancer.Pub Date: July 12, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-250-27827-2
Page Count: 192
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: July 27, 2022
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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