The Lunar Men
The Lunar Society of Birmingham, led by Erasmus Darwin, was founded in the 1760s by a group of amateur experimenters, traders, and artisans who met and became friends in the Midlands. Most came from modest backgrounds and lived in remote locations, but they were youthful and full of hope: together, they would transform the world. The ambitious toy-maker Matthew Boulton and his collaborator James Watt, of steam-engine renown; the potter Josiah Wedgwood; and the larger-than-life Erasmus Darwin, physician, poet, inventor, and evolution theorist, were among them (a forerunner of his grandson Charles Darwin). Joseph Priestley, the discoverer of oxygen and radical fighter, arrived later.
They gathered a tiny band of allies, created the Lunar Society of Birmingham (so named because it met every full moon), and kicked off the Industrial Revolution, led by Erasmus Darwin. The Lunar Men created canals, launched balloons, named plants, gases, and minerals, transformed the look of England and the china in its drawing rooms, and intended to revolutionize its soul by combining science, art, and commerce.
The Lunar Men by Jenny Uglow is a vibrant and enthralling group picture that vividly depicts the friendships, political passions, love relationships, and hunger for knowledge (and power) that propelled these amazing men. It echoes the thud of pistons and the wheeze and snort of engines, and it brings the craftsmen, artisans, and tycoons who fashioned and ignited the engines to life.
Winner of the PEN Hessel-Tiltman prize for history, and the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for biography, The Lunar Men captures the creation of the modern world with lucid intelligence, sympathy and wisdom. Jenny Uglow is also the prize-winning author of Nature's Engraver, Elizabeth Gaskell: A Habit of Stories and most recently, In These Times.
