ALSO BY ANDREA WULF

Chasing Venus: The Race to Measure the Heavens

Founding Gardeners: The Revolutionary Generation, Nature, and the Shaping of the American Nation

The Brother Gardeners: Botany, Empire and the Birth of an Obsession

This Other Eden: Seven Great Gardens and 300 Years of English History

(with Emma Gieben-Gamal)

THIS IS A BORZOI BOOK

PUBLISHED BY ALFRED A. KNOPF

Copyright © 2015 by Andrea Wulf

All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York, and distributed in Canada by Random House of Canada, a division of Penguin Random House Ltd., Toronto. Simultaneously published in Great Britain by John Murray (Publishers), a Hachette UK Company, London.

www.aaknopf.com

Knopf, Borzoi Books, and the colophon are registered trademarks of Penguin Random House LLC.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Wulf, Andrea.

The invention of nature : Alexander von Humboldt’s new world / by Andrea Wulf.—First American Edition.

pages cm

“THIS IS A BORZOI BOOK”—T.p. verso.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-0-385-35066-2 (hardcover)—ISBN 978-0-385-35067-9 (eBook)

1. Humbolt, Alexander von, 1769–1859. 2. Scientists—Germany—Biography. 3. Naturalists—Germany—Biography. I. Title.

Q143.H9W85 2015

509.2—dc23

[B]               2015017505

Cover design by Kelly Blair

Maps drawn by Rodney Paull

v3.1

To Linnéa (P.o.P.)

Close your eyes, prick your ears, and from the softest sound to the wildest noise, from the simplest tone to the highest harmony, from the most violent, passionate scream to the gentlest words of sweet reason, it is by Nature who speaks, revealing her being, her power, her life, and her relatedness so that a blind person, to whom the infinitely visible world is denied, can grasp an infinite vitality in what can be heard.

—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Contents

Cover

Other Books by This Author

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Epigraph

Maps

Author’s Note

Prologue

PART I. DEPARTURE: EMERGING IDEAS

1. Beginnings

2. Imagination and Nature: Johann Wolfgang von Goethe and Humboldt

3. In Search of a Destination

PART II. ARRIVAL: COLLECTING IDEAS

4. South America

5. The Llanos and the Orinoco

6. Across the Andes

7. Chimborazo

8. Politics and Nature: Thomas Jefferson and Humboldt

PART III. RETURN: SORTING IDEAS

9. Europe

10. Berlin

11. Paris

12. Revolutions and Nature: Simón Bolívar and Humboldt

13. London

14. Going in Circles: Maladie Centrifuge

PART IV. INFLUENCE: SPREADING IDEAS

15. Return to Berlin

16. Russia

17. Evolution and Nature: Charles Darwin and Humboldt

18. Humboldt’s

Cosmos

19. Poetry, Science and Nature: Henry David Thoreau and Humboldt

PART V. NEW WORLDS: EVOLVING IDEAS

20. The Greatest Man Since the Deluge

21. Man and Nature: George Perkins Marsh and Humboldt

22. Art, Ecology and Nature: Ernst Haeckel and Humboldt

23. Preservation and Nature: John Muir and Humboldt

Epilogue

Acknowledgements

Illustration Credits

Notes

A Note on Humboldt’s Publications

Sources and Bibliography

Index

Illustrations

Maps

Humboldt’s Journey Across the Americas, 1799–1804

Humboldt’s Journey through Venezuela, 1800

Humboldt’s Journey Across Russia, 1829

Author’s Note

Alexander von Humboldt’s books have been published in many languages. When quoting from his books directly, I have compared the original German (where applicable) and contemporary English editions. Where newer English editions have been available, I have checked those against the older translations and where I felt that the newer edition provided a better translation, I have chosen that version (details are in the endnotes). Sometimes neither translation captured Humboldt’s prose, or whole sentences were missing – in which case I have taken the liberty of providing a new translation. When other protagonists referred to Humboldt’s work, I have used the editions that they were reading. Charles Darwin, for example, read Humboldt’s Personal Narrative that was published in Britain between 1814 and 1829 (translated by Helen Maria Williams), while John Muir read the 1896 edition (translated by E.C. Otte and H.G. Bohn).

Prologue