I’m currently reading this book and its driving me crazy! As well as a short history of scientific ideas its full of little anecdotes about scientists. One of these is about James Parkinson- alround brilliant guy and keen researcher on Parkinsons disease (shaking palsy). Bryson tells us that he was the first guy to win a narural history museum in a competition; which made me wonder if previously people had won other types of musuems….. I shared this story with my husband who did a quick bit of internet research and found that Wikipedia claims that there are 2 James Parkinsons….one who was an all round great doctor and the other a property developer who won the museum that nearly drove him to ruin as it wasn’t ‘the done’ thing for a gentleman to charge admission to his museum and upkeep costs were high.
There are no other references to people winning museums (or indeed to this particular win)- Wikipedia is obviously not entirely reliable but in this case its so specific; and to be so so specifically wrong…
Bryson…hmmm well I wasn’t going to read this book because the last book he wrote that I read (Notes to a Small Island) annoyed me so much! He referred to George Orwells Road to Wigan Pier as an example of poor research as Wigan doesn’t have a pier- Orwell actually knew this and was referring to a popular joke of the time….although I was also annoyed with him for disliking Manchester (my native town and first love) and for saying he couldn’t imagine why anybody would go to Bradford as it was such a dump (I’m paraphrasing here) and that Saltaire was wonderful…Saltaire is a part of Bradford and actually is like the rest of it but has been ‘gentified’.
So anyway, I’m now reading this book but unsure wether to trust it or not…however I’m finding it really interesting to be reminded of the big ideas; big bang; infinity; neutrons, electrons….etc
Tags: books, bryson. pedant, short history of nearly everything
