The Invention of Nature

Alexander von Humboldt’s name is synonymous with scientific discovery today–the Humboldt Current, the Humboldt Redwoods State Park, and countless species named for him. Humboldt revolutionized our modern understanding of the natural sciences–geology, biology, meteorology, and much else–with his epic five-year voyage that set off in 1799 and brought him through the Amazon, the Caribbean, and North and South America. 

Like Malaspina before him, Humboldt studied not only the flora and fauna of these regions but also their peoples and the political turmoil that was building towards revolution. He met with the leaders of the time–Thomas Jefferson and Simón Bolívar among… show more.

I'll be frank: if you read a book at the beach and a year later you still have lasting memories that resonate within you, that must mean something.

I still remember how Wulf walked me through the revolutionary vision of Humboldt, how he could “see” what nobody else was capable of in his days, and to the naked eye: that everything is interconnected. I again felt dizzy, with a sense of myopia, when thinking about how shortsighted we are in 2024.

We keep missing the plot! If only there were more Humboldts and Wulfs to inspire us as she did!

No one did more to turn exploration into a scientific enterprise than Alexander von Humboldt, the German naturalist whose five-year-long expedition into Latin America turned him into one of the most famous and influential figures of the 19th century.

Wolf brings this amazing figure, now largely forgotten, back to life in her fascinating biography. What I found especially compelling and timely about her account of Humboldt is that it highlights his contributions to the birth of modern environmentalism.

Humboldt’s expansive inquiries into the natural world demonstrated that it has to be understood as a complex, interconnected whole. It’s a lesson… show more.

This is the story of Alexander von Humboldt and how he influenced our views today about nature. It reveals a grand story hiding in plain sight—a chronicle of one man’s exercise of intellectual freedom that shaped the scientific and political views of Thomas Jefferson, Charles Darwin, Simon Bolivar, and Henry David Thoreau. 

I love this grand biography of a somewhat forgotten man who was one of the most famous figures of his time (second only to Napoleon). After reading this illuminating book, I now view him not only as a great naturalist and explorer but as a visionary whose ideas were prescient—including his anticipation of the ravaging effects of human-induced climate change.

I loved meeting—within the book—Darwin, Goethe, Ernst Haekel (who coined the word ecology), Jefferson, Thoreau, and so many others whom interacted with the great polymath, Humboldt. This book has had a profound influence of my own writing about the natural… show more.

Even prior to reading this book, I casually considered Alexander von Humboldt to be one of my geographical heroes, a workaholic as addicted to adventure as he was obsessed with advancing our understanding of the planet.

However, Wulf’s book opened my eyes not only to the sheer extent of his contributions to how we view the world, from human-induced climate change to the development of increasingly accurate and informative maps and diagrams but also to his cultural and political significance, influencing politicians and inspiring poets to continue fashioning and representing the planet as they see fit.

In placing the… show more.

Germans can be romantic, too, if they set about it in earnest.

Young Alexander von Humboldt didn’t do things by halves. He made his own muscles twitch rather than a dead frog’s. Initially, he used the current from a galvanic cell (which made him faint). He later took up electric eels from Venezuela, caught with the unwilling help of wild horses.

Humboldt spent a large part of his fortune on a five-year journey through Latin America, which catapulted him to fame. The rest of his money went into publishing dozens of volumes relating to his explorations and describing the Cosmos,… show more.

The author has spent considerable time pursuing and following in the footsteps of Alexander von Humboldt, and we are all the better for it as readers of her wonderful biography and historical account.

This fascinating and influential, but often forgotten, man influenced the great scientists and scholars of the 19th Cent. like no other. Without Humboldt, there would have been no Darwin, by his own admission, and countless other major figures owed their famous predecessor this same debt.

His resurgence in recent years as the Father of Ecology has brought his name to the forefront once more. Wulf’s detailed… show more.

This biography of Alexander von Humboldt is very worthy for a ton of reasons, but Humboldt’s explorations in the Americas between 1799-1804 get him on this list.

Thomas Jefferson called Humboldt “the most scientific man of the age” for good reason: Humboldt is considered the father of ecology, and of the study of the environment. One of the best narrative nonfiction books of recent years.

We live in a golden age of discovering complex systems. The path was opened by the science of ecology, which Alexander von Humboldt founded in the early 1800s after years of exploring South America. Taking meticulous observations and recognising and communicating patterns that connect great swathes of the biosphere, Humboldt was inspired by the indigenous peoples with whom he lived and worked. The eternal need for reciprocity and peace with nature are the common insights of ecology and indigenous cultures from the Andes to Australia. They offer a great theme opposed to the other, darker inventions of recent centuries: imperialism,… show more.