Volume
78, No.
NEW
BIOLOGICAL BOOKS
The
Romantic Conception of Life: Science and
Philosophy in the Age of Goethe. Science
and Its
Conceptual Foundations.
By Robert J Richards.
index. ISBN: 0–226–71210–9. 2002.
In
this masterful study of the intellectual background
of early 19th-century biology, the
author
argues that the standard reading of the
influence
of Romanticism and Naturphilosophie
on the development
of modern biology is radically
mistaken.
Instead
of being aberrations with no significant
influence on future developments, he argues
that
these movements shaped the questions and,
to a
certain extent, the range of acceptable
solutions
that came to characterize the
evolutionary view of
life in the latter part of the 19th
century and which
continues to the present day. In a final
Epilogue,
Richards
even goes so far as to argue that Charles
The
author’s approach is biographical. He gives
a finely nuanced characterization of
the major figures
of the Romantic movement and of the Naturphilosophes.
The
central figure of the saga is Johann
Wolfgang
von Goethe, that larger than life polymath
who dominated the European intellectual
landscape at the end of the 18th and beginning
of
the 19th centuries. The leitmotif of
the book: Goethe
was a romantic in spite of himself.
What Richards
takes the Romantic conception of life to
be is
captured in a citation from Friedrich
Schlegel at
the beginning of the book: “All art should
become
science and all science art; poetry and
philosophy
should be made one.”
Part
One, The Early Romantic Movement in Literature,
Philosophy,
and Science, examines the
lives, work, and influence of the
literary critics Wilhelm
and Friedrich Schlegel and their wives
and
friends, the poets Novalis
and Friedrich Schiller,
and the philosophers Johann Fichte,
Friedrich
Schelling, and Friedrich Schleiermacher.
Part
Two,
Scientific Foundations of the Romantic Conception
of Life, looks at the influence of Johann
Blumenbach
and Immanuel Kant on early 19thcentury
theories of evolution and development.
The
third part, Goethe, A Genius for Poetry, Morphology,
and Women, is a sympathetic
reinterpretation
of the significance of Goethe’s
contributions
to the development of modern science.
This
is a page-turning read and a must for anyone
interested in the history of 19th-century
biology.
Even
those who will take issue with some of
the more radical interpretations
offered by Richards
cannot fail to come away with a deeper
understanding
of the philosophical foundations of
modern
biology.
Michael
Bradie, Philosophy,
University,