The Book That Changed America

The Book That Changed America
Author: Randall Fuller
Publisher: Penguin
Total Pages: 314
Release: 2018-01-02
Genre: History
ISBN: 0143130099


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A compelling portrait of a unique moment in American history when the ideas of Charles Darwin reshaped American notions about nature, religion, science and race “A lively and informative history.” – The New York Times Book Review Throughout its history America has been torn in two by debates over ideals and beliefs. Randall Fuller takes us back to one of those turning points, in 1860, with the story of the influence of Charles Darwin’s just-published On the Origin of Species on five American intellectuals, including Bronson Alcott, Henry David Thoreau, the child welfare reformer Charles Loring Brace, and the abolitionist Franklin Sanborn. Each of these figures seized on the book’s assertion of a common ancestry for all creatures as a powerful argument against slavery, one that helped provide scientific credibility to the cause of abolition. Darwin’s depiction of constant struggle and endless competition described America on the brink of civil war. But some had difficulty aligning the new theory to their religious convictions and their faith in a higher power. Thoreau, perhaps the most profoundly affected all, absorbed Darwin’s views into his mysterious final work on species migration and the interconnectedness of all living things. Creating a rich tableau of nineteenth-century American intellectual culture, as well as providing a fascinating biography of perhaps the single most important idea of that time, The Book That Changed America is also an account of issues and concerns still with us today, including racism and the enduring conflict between science and religion.


The Book That Changed America
Language: en
Pages: 314
Authors: Randall Fuller
Categories: History
Type: BOOK - Published: 2018-01-02 - Publisher: Penguin

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A compelling portrait of a unique moment in American history when the ideas of Charles Darwin reshaped American notions about nature, religion, science and race
The Book That Changed America
Language: en
Pages: 304
Authors: Randall Fuller
Categories: History
Type: BOOK - Published: 2017-01-24 - Publisher: Penguin

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A compelling portrait of a unique moment in American history when the ideas of Charles Darwin reshaped American notions about nature, religion, science and race
The Camping Trip that Changed America
Language: en
Pages: 36
Authors: Barb Rosenstock
Categories: Juvenile Nonfiction
Type: BOOK - Published: 2012-01-19 - Publisher: Penguin

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Caldecott medalist Mordicai Gerstein captures the majestic redwoods of Yosemite in this little-known but important story from our nation's history. In 1903, Pre
Twenty-five Books That Shaped America
Language: en
Pages: 267
Authors: Thomas C. Foster
Categories: Literary Criticism
Type: BOOK - Published: 2011-05-24 - Publisher: Harper Collins

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From the author of the New York Times bestselling How to Read Literature Like a Professor comes a highly entertaining and informative book on the twenty-five wo
Stories that Changed America
Language: en
Pages: 273
Authors: Carl Jensen
Categories: Political Science
Type: BOOK - Published: 2011-01-04 - Publisher: Seven Stories Press

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Exuberantly written, highly informative, Jensen's Stories That Changed America examines the work of twenty-one investigative writers, and how their efforts fore