The Age of Wonder
The Age of Wonder

Author: Richard Holmes

Publisher: Vintage

Published: 2010-03-02

Total Pages: 578

ISBN-13: 1400031877

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The Age of Wonder is a colorful and utterly absorbing history of the men and women whose discoveries and inventions at the end of the eighteenth century gave birth to the Romantic Age of Science. When young Joseph Banks stepped onto a Tahitian beach in 1769, he hoped to discover Paradise. Inspired by the scientific ferment sweeping through Britain, the botanist had sailed with Captain Cook in search of new worlds. Other voyages of discovery—astronomical, chemical, poetical, philosophical—swiftly follow in Richard Holmes's thrilling evocation of the second scientific revolution. Through the lives of William Herschel and his sister Caroline, who forever changed the public conception of the solar system; of Humphry Davy, whose near-suicidal gas experiments revolutionized chemistry; and of the great Romantic writers, from Mary Shelley to Coleridge and Keats, who were inspired by the scientific breakthroughs of their day, Holmes brings to life the era in which we first realized both the awe-inspiring and the frightening possibilities of science—an era whose consequences are with us still.

The Age of Wonder
The Age of Wonder

Author: Richard Holmes

Publisher: Vintage

Published: 2009-07-14

Total Pages: 601

ISBN-13: 0307378322

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The Age of Wonder is a colorful and utterly absorbing history of the men and women whose discoveries and inventions at the end of the eighteenth century gave birth to the Romantic Age of Science. When young Joseph Banks stepped onto a Tahitian beach in 1769, he hoped to discover Paradise. Inspired by the scientific ferment sweeping through Britain, the botanist had sailed with Captain Cook in search of new worlds. Other voyages of discovery—astronomical, chemical, poetical, philosophical—swiftly follow in Richard Holmes's thrilling evocation of the second scientific revolution. Through the lives of William Herschel and his sister Caroline, who forever changed the public conception of the solar system; of Humphry Davy, whose near-suicidal gas experiments revolutionized chemistry; and of the great Romantic writers, from Mary Shelley to Coleridge and Keats, who were inspired by the scientific breakthroughs of their day, Holmes brings to life the era in which we first realized both the awe-inspiring and the frightening possibilities of science—an era whose consequences are with us still. BONUS MATERIAL: This ebook edition includes an excerpt from Richard Holmes's Falling Upwards.

Age of Wonders
Age of Wonders

Author: David G. Hartwell

Publisher: Macmillan

Published: 2017-01-24

Total Pages: 313

ISBN-13: 0765398133

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Age of Wonders: Exploring the World of Science Fiction gives an insider's view of the strange and wonderful world of science fiction, by one of the most respected editors in the field, David G. Hartwell (1941–2016). David G. Hartwell edited science fiction and fantasy for over twenty years. In that time, he worked with acclaimed and popular writers such as Robert A. Heinlein, Poul Anderson, Frank Herbert, Roger Zelazny, Robert Silverberg, Gene Wolfe, Nancy Kress, L.E. Modesitt, Terry Bisson, Lisa Goldstein, and Philip Jose Farmer, and discovered hot new talents like Kathleen Ann Goonan and Patrick O'Leary. Now in Age of Wonder, Hartwell describes the field he loved, worked in, and shaped as editor, critic, and anthologist. Like those other American art forms, jazz, comics, and rock 'n' roll, science fiction is the product of a rich and fascinating subculture. Age of Wonder is a fascinating tour of the origins, history, and culture of the science fiction world, written with insight and genuine affection for this wonder-filled literature, and addressed to newcomers and longtime SF readers alike. Age of Wonder remains "the landmark work" Roger Zelazny called the first edition. The book contains sections that offer advice on teaching courses in science fiction, disquisitions on the controversial subgenre of hard SF, and practical explanations of the economics of publishing science fiction and fantasy. Age of Wonder still lives up to Hugo and Nebula Award winner Vonda McIntyre's description: "An entertaining and provocative book that will inspire discussion and argument for years to come."

Toys in the Age of Wonder
Toys in the Age of Wonder

Author: Mark Rich

Publisher: McFarland

Published: 2020-09-23

Total Pages: 345

ISBN-13: 0786443928

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By the middle 1800s, toys were appearing in forms that drew upon--and that inspired--advances in areas such as optics, biology, geography, transportation, and automation. In these decades, too, a new type of wonder tale was being brought to maturity by a Poe-inspired Jules Verne. The modern wonder tale's highly-charged vision expressed the hopes and the fears, and the delights and the traumas, engendered by "new worlds idealism"--that Western pursuit of both mechanical and geographical conquest. Exploring realms belonging to childhood, literature, science, and history, this innovative study weaves together the histories of wonder tales and children's toys, focusing specifically on their modern aspects and how they reflect and express the social attitudes of that time period beginning around 1859 and ending around 1957.

The Age of Wonder
The Age of Wonder

Author: Richard Holmes

Publisher: Pantheon

Published: 2008

Total Pages: 552

ISBN-13: 9780375422225

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The winner of the Somerset Maugham Award presents the earliest ideas of the explorers of “dynamic science,” including William Herschel and his sister, Caroline, who changed the public's ideas about stars, and Humphry Davy, who invented the miners' lamp.

Eighteenth-century Fiction and the Reinvention of Wonder
Eighteenth-century Fiction and the Reinvention of Wonder

Author: Sarah Tindal Kareem

Publisher:

Published: 2014

Total Pages: 305

ISBN-13: 0199689105

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A footprint materializes mysteriously on a deserted shore; a giant helmet falls from the sky; a traveler awakens to find his horse dangling from a church steeple. Eighteenth-century British fiction brims with moments such as these, in which the prosaic rubs up against the marvelous. While it is a truism that the period's literature is distinguished by its realism and air of probability, Eighteenth-Century Fiction and the Reinvention of Wonder argues that wonder is integral to--rather than antithetical to--the developing techniques of novelistic fiction. Positioning its reader on the cusp between recognition and estrangement, between faith and doubt, modern fiction hinges upon wonder. Eighteenth-Century Fiction and the Reinvention of Wonder's chapters unfold its new account of British fiction's rise through surprising new readings of classic early novels-from Daniel Defoe's Robinson Crusoe to Jane Austen's Northanger Abbey--as well as bringing to attention lesser known works, most notably Rudolf Raspe's Baron Munchausen's Narrative of His Marvellous Travels. In this bold new account, the eighteenth century bears witness not to the world's disenchantment but rather to wonder's re-location from the supernatural realm to the empirical world, providing a re-evaluation not only of how we look back at the Enlightenment, but also of how we read today.

Iyanu: Child of Wonder Volume 2
Iyanu: Child of Wonder Volume 2

Author: Roye Okupe

Publisher: Dark Horse Comics

Published: 2022-10-25

Total Pages: 148

ISBN-13: 1506723055

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Soon to be a Cartoon Network/Max/Lion Forge Animation animated series! The orphan Iyanu is thrust into the wildlands beyond the safety of the walls of her home! She must quickly learn to work with an exile and the people of the Riverlands Settlement if she hopes to save her mentor. Meanwhile, Chancellor Nuro finalizes a diabolical plan that threatens to destroy the entirety of Yorubaland in his greedy hunt to capture Iyanu, also known now as the Chosen One! The YouNeek line at Dark Horse expands with this fantastic graphic novel series!

Clockwork Futures
Clockwork Futures

Author: Brandy Schillace

Publisher: Simon and Schuster

Published: 2017-09-05

Total Pages: 390

ISBN-13: 1681775824

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Airships and electric submarines, automatons and mesmerists—welcome to the wild world of steampunk. It is all speculative—or is it? Meet the intrepid souls who pushed Victorian technology to its limits and paved the way for our present age. The gear turns, the whistle blows, and the billows expand with electro-mechanical whirring. The shimmering halo of Victorian technology lures us with the stuff of dreams, of nostalgia, of alternate pasts and futures that entice with the suave of James Bond and the savvy of Sherlock Holmes. Fiction, surely. But what if the unusual gadgetry so often depicted as “steampunk” actually made an appearance in history? Zeppelins and steam-trains; arc-lights and magnetic rays: these fascinating (and sometimes doomed) inventions bounded from the tireless minds of unlikely heroes. Such men and women served no secret societies and fought no super-villains, but they did build engines, craft automatons, and engineer a future they hoped would run like clockwork. Along the way, however, these same inventors ushered in a contest between desire and dread. From Newton to Tesla, from candle and clockwork to the age of electricity and manufactured power, technology teetered between the bright dials of fantastic futures and the dark alleyways of industrial catastrophe. In the mesmerizing Clockwork Futures, Brandy Schillace reveals the science behind steampunk, which is every bit as extraordinary as what we might find in the work of Jules Verne, and sometimes, just as fearful. These stories spring from the scientific framework we have inherited. They shed light on how we pursue science, and how we grapple with our destiny—yesterday, today, and tomorrow.

The Age of Edison
The Age of Edison

Author: Ernest Freeberg

Publisher: Penguin

Published: 2013-02-21

Total Pages: 307

ISBN-13: 1101605472

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A sweeping history of the electric light revolution and the birth of modern America The late nineteenth century was a period of explosive technological creativity, but more than any other invention, Thomas Edison’s incandescent light bulb marked the arrival of modernity, transforming its inventor into a mythic figure and avatar of an era. In The Age of Edison, award-winning author and historian Ernest Freeberg weaves a narrative that reaches from Coney Island and Broadway to the tiniest towns of rural America, tracing the progress of electric light through the reactions of everyone who saw it and capturing the wonder Edison’s invention inspired. It is a quintessentially American story of ingenuity, ambition, and possibility in which the greater forces of progress and change are made by one of our most humble and ubiquitous objects.

Travellers' Tales of Wonder
Travellers' Tales of Wonder

Author: Simon Cooke

Publisher: Edinburgh University Press

Published: 2013-02-22

Total Pages: 216

ISBN-13: 0748675477

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Exploring travellers' tales of wonder in contemporary literature, this study challenges a sensibility of disenchantment with travel. It reassesses travel writing as an aesthetically and ethically innovative form in contemporary international literature, and demonstrates the crucial role of wonder in the travel narratives of writers such as Bruce Chatwin, V.S. Naipaul, and W.G. Sebald. Their 'travellers' tales of wonder' are read as a challenge to the hubris of thinking the world too well known, and an invitation to encounter the world - including its most troubling histories - with a sense of wonder.