It was back in 2005 (is that really 19 years ago?) that I acquired my own copy of Ecology and Evolution of Darwin's Finches and was, to use a vernacular expression, "blown away."
My book is the 1999 version with the foreword by Jonathan Weiner - so what to do but get a copy of The Beak of the Finch? If anything the "blowing away" was getting stronger!
As a lifelong student of Charles Darwin and a staunch follower of David Lack, this unique study of evolution in real time was a revelation of epic proportions.
I became a committed, dedicated admirer of Peter and Rosemary Grant, and eagerly read everything else they had written. My level of awe (I don't think that's hyperbole) was magnified. On one small island in The Galápagos these two scientists, man and wife, partners always, revolutionized our understanding of life on Earth.
Their commitment, their tenacity, their dedication to excellence, their results, their contribution to science are the stuff of legend.
When Princeton published the biographies of Peter and Rosemary (delightful in the extreme) I thought I had it all, but the circle is closing perhaps with this latest addition to the canon.
It updates the original, enhances and primps, reflects advances in technology, presents new facts, but the essential work remains the same. I am bound to say that this was a difficult book to review, since I was constantly referring to the original works, then dipping into Weiner's Pulitzer Prize-winning book, and going back and forth to both biographies - but what an enjoyable experience, time consuming though it was.
It is daunting even to think of conducting a study for forty years, especially on a hunk of volcanic rock sticking out of the ocean, difficult to get to, hazardous to land on, and lacking in creature comforts of even the most basic kind. How many scientists have to make do with a cave as both their kitchen and their lab? How many scientists have the tenacity to carry on year after year? It seems to me that a man and wife team - a team of equals I hasten to add - makes it all the more remarkable.
There is surely an element of unalloyed joy that this seminal research was carried out on Darwin's Finches, those very birds that set the stage for On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life, ( I relish the full title!) - not without a little help from Mr. Gould I might add. I think that to refer to Peter Grant, or Rosemary Grant, as the new Darwin merely recognizes their phenomenal accomplishments, and does not exceed the bounds of reason and good taste.
Their work is monumental. I doubt whether anything will come close to matching it for a very long time.
In retirement the Grants have received honours and tributes from all over the world, richly deserved, earned in the fires of excellence. I salute them and thank them for bringing so much pleasure and learning to my life.
It has been a privilege to know them vicariously.
Initially, I had a quote from Darwin in mind to end this review but I have discarded it. What better ending than Peter's own coda?
The cradle that is Daphne was once undersea
Umbilicaled to Santiago
She emerged from a deep subterranean sleep
The year, an exceptional El Niño
Daphne is a cradle that is now above sea
She nurtured the birth of a finch
Compounded of genes from two species or more
The beak much less than an inch
The cradle that is Daphne will sink once again
Or explode and then it will be gone
By then the finches will have flown elsewhere
Continuing to evolve, on and on
40 Years of Evolution: Darwin's Finches on Daphne Major Island, New Edition - Princeton University Press
Peter T. Grant and B. Rosemary Grant
Paperback - $39.95USD - ISBN: 9780691263229
464 pages - 6.125 x 9.25 inches (15.31 x 23.125 cm)
185 black-and-white illustrations - 21 tables
Publication date: 12 November 2024
...you sure let your passion show!!!
ReplyDeletePassion is the only worthy response to the Grants, Tom.
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