The Invention of Nature

by Andrea Wulf

  2 signs of organic life disappeared: AH to WH, 25 November 1802, AH WH Letters 1880, p.49.

  3 ‘trapped inside an air’: AH, About an Attempt to Climb to the Top of Chimborazo, Kutzinski 2012, p.143.

  4 a ‘magnificent sight’: Ibid., p.142.

  5 size of crevasse: AH gave different measurements: for example, 400 feet deep and 60 feet wide in ibid., p.142.

  6 AH measured altitude: 5917.16m – AH, 23 June 1802, AH Diary 2003, vol.2, p.106.

  7 AH and Napoleon: Ralph Waldo Emerson to John F. Heath, 4 August 1842, Emerson 1939, vol.3, p.77.

  8 ‘half an American’: Rossiter Raymond, 14 May 1859, AH Letters USA 2004, p.572.

  9 ‘a Cartesian vortex’: AH to Karl August Varnhagen, 31 July 1854, Humboldt Varnhagen Letters 1860, p.235.

  10 ‘three things at’: AH, quoted in Leitzmann 1936, p.210.

  11 ‘love of nature’: Arnold Henry Guyot, 2 June 1859, Humboldt Commemorations, Journal of the American Geographical and Statistical Society, vol.1, no.8, October 1859, p.242; Rachel Carson’s The Sense of Wonder, 1965.

  12 nature and feeling: AH to Goethe, 3 January 1810, Goethe Humboldt Letters 1909, p.305.

  13 ‘run through the’: Matthias Jacob Schleiden, 14 September 1869, Jahn 2004.

  14 ‘whose eyes are natural’: Ralph Waldo Emerson, notes for Humboldt speech on 14 September 1869, Emerson 1960–92, vol.16, p.160.

  15 ‘In this great chain’: AH Geography 2009, p.79; AH Geography 1807, p.39.

  16 climate change: AH Personal Narrative 1814–29, vol.4, p.140ff.; AH, 4 March 1800, AH Diary 2000, p.216.

  17 ecological functions of forest: AH, September 1799, AH Diary 2000, p.140; AH Aspects 1849, vol.1, pp.126–7; AH Views 2014, p.83; AH Ansichten 1849, vol.1, p.158; AH Personal Narrative 1814–29, vol.4, p.477.

  18 ‘future generations’: AH Personal Narrative 1814–29, vol.4, p.143.

  19 ‘one of the greatest’: Thomas Jefferson to Carlo de Vidua, 6 August 1825, AH Letters USA 2004, p.171.

  20 ‘nothing ever stimulated’: Darwin to Alfred Russel Wallace, 22 September 1865, Darwin Correspondence, vol.13, p.238.

  21 ‘discoverer of the New’: Bolívar to Madame Bonpland, 23 October 1823, Rippy and Brann 1947, p.701.

  22 ‘having lived several’: Goethe to Johann Peter Eckermann, 12 December 1828, Goethe Eckermann 1999, p.183.

  23 Melbourne and Adelaide: Melbourner Deutsche Zeitung, 16 September 1869; South Australian Advertiser, 20 September 1869; South Australian Register, 22 September 1869; Standard, Buenos Aires, 19 September 1869; Two Republics, Mexico City, 19 September 1869; New York Herald, 1 October 1869; Daily Evening Bulletin, 2 November 1869.

  24 ‘Shakespeare of sciences’: Herman Trautschold, 1869, Roussanova 2013, p.45.

  25 Alexandria, Egypt: Ibid.: Die Gartenlaube, no.43, 1869.

  26 American celebrations: Desert News, 22 September 1869; New York Herald, 15 September 1869; New York Times, 15 September 1869; Charleston Daily Courier, 15 September 1869; Philadelphia Inquirer, 14 September 1869.

  27 Cleveland and Syracuse: New York Herald, 15 September 1869.

  28 Pittsburgh: Desert News, 22 September 1869.

  29 ‘whose fame no nation’ and New York celebrations: New York Times, 15 September 1869; New York Herald, 15 September 1869.

  30 ‘as standing on’: Franz Lieber, New York Times, 15 September 1869.

  31 an ‘inner correlation’: Norddeutsches Protestantenblatt, Bremen, 11 September 1869; Glogau, Heinrich, ‘Akademische Festrede zur Feier des Hundertjährigen Geburtstages Alexander’s von Humboldt, 14 September 1869’, Glogau 1869, p.11; Agassiz, Louis, ‘Address Delivered on the Centennial Anniversary of the Birth of Alexander von Humboldt 1869’, Agassiz 1869, pp.5, 48; Herman Trautschold, 1869, Roussanova 2013, p.50; Philadelphia Inquirer, 15 September 1869; Humboldt Commemorations, 2 June 1859, Journal of American Geological and Statistical Society, 1859, vol.1, p.226.

  32 ‘one of those wonders’: Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1869, Emerson 1960–92, vol.16, p.160; Agassiz 1869, p.71.

  33 ‘in some sort’: Daily News, London, 14 September 1869.

  34 German celebrations: Jahn 2004, pp.18–28.

  35 Berlin: Illustrirte Zeitung Berlin, 2 October 1869; Vossische Zeitung, 15 September 1869; Allgemeine Zeitung Augsburg, 17 September 1869.

  36 AH’s name across the world: Oppitz 1969, pp.281–427.

  37 Nevada called Humboldt: The decision was between Washoe, Esmeralda, Nevada and Humboldt; Oppitz 1969, p.290.

  38 more places named after AH: Egerton 2012, p.121.

  39 ‘as a natural whole’: AH Cosmos 1845–52, vol.1, p.45; AH Kosmos 1845–50, vol.1, p.52.

  40 ‘Gäa’ as title: AH to Karl August Varnhagen, 24 October 1834, Humboldt Varnhagen Letters 1860, p.18.

  41 ‘the clearest way’: Wolfe 1979, p.313.

  Chapter 1: Beginnings

  1 AH family: AH, Meine Bekenntnisse, 1769–1805, Biermann 1987, p.50ff.; Beck 1959–61, vol.1, p.3ff.; Geier 2010, p.16ff.

  2 AH’s godfather: This was Prince Friedrich Wilhelm who became King Friedrich Wilhelm II in 1786.

  3 unhappy childhood: AH to Carl Freiesleben, 5 June 1792, AH Letters 1973, p.191ff.; WH to CH, April 1790, WH CH Letters 1910–16, vol.1, p.134.

  4 character AH’s parents: Frau von Briest, 1785, WH CH Letters 1910–16, vol.1, p.55.

  5 Kunth’s teaching: WH to CH, 2 April 1790, ibid., pp.115–16; Geier 2010, p.22ff.; Beck 1959–61, vol.1, p.6ff.

  6 ‘perpetual anxiety’: WH to CH, 2 April 1790, WH CH Letters 1910–16, vol.1, p.115.

  7 ‘were doubtful whether’: AH to Carl Freiesleben, Bruhns 1873, vol.1, p.31; and AH, Aus Meinem Leben (1769–1850), in Biermann 1987, p.50.

  8 WH and ancient Greek: Geier 2010, p.29.

  9 ‘the little apothecary’: Bruhns 1873, vol.1, p.20; Beck 1959–61, vol.1, p.10.

  10 ‘Yes, Sir, but with’: Walls 2009, p.15.

  11 ‘intellectual and moral’: Kunth about Marie Elisabeth von Humboldt, Beck 1959–61, vol.1, p.6.

  12 ‘I was forced into’: AH to Carl Freiesleben, 5 June 1792, AH Letters 1973, p.192.

  13 AH and WH different: WH to CH, 9 October 1804, WH CH Letters 1910–16, vol.2, p.260.

  14 WH character: WH 1903–36, vol.15, p.455.

  15 North American trees at Tegel: AH to Carl Freiesleben, 5 June 1792, AH Letters 1973, p.191; Bruhns 1873, vol.3, pp.12–13.

  16 nature was soothing: AH to WH, 19 May 1829, AH Letters Russia 2009, p.116.

  17 AH’s height: AH’s passport on leaving Paris in 1798, Bruhns 1873, vol.1, p.394.

  18 AH slight and nimble: Karoline Bauer, 1876, Clark and Lubrich 2012, p.199; AH’s hands, Louise von Bornstedt, 1856, Beck 1959, p.385.

  19 a ‘kind of hypochondria’: WH to CH, 2 April 1790, p.116; see also WH to CH, 3 June 1791, WH CH Letters 1910–16, vol.1, pp.116, 477; for illnesses, see AH to Wilhelm Gabriel Wegener, 24, 25, 27 February 1789 and 5 June 1790, AH Letters 1973, pp.39, 92.

  20 ‘un petit esprit malin’: Dove 1881, p.83; for later comments, see Caspar Voght, 14 February 1808, Voght 1959–65, vol.3, p.95.

  21 AH malicious streak: Arago about AH, Biermann and Schwarz 2001b, no page no.

  22 AH not spiteful: WH about AH, 1788, Dove 1881, p.83.

  23 AH torn: WH to CH, 6 November 1790, WH CH Letters 1910–16, vol.1, p.270.

  24 universities and reading in Germany: Watson 2010, p.55ff.

  25 ‘great and complicated’: George Cheyne, Worster 1977, p.40.

  26 ‘republic of letters’: this was a widely used term; see for example Joseph Pitton de Tournefort to Hans Sloane, 14 January 1701/2 and John Locke to Hans Sloane, 14 September 1694, MacGregor 1994, p.19.

  27 AH and WH in Berlin: Bruhns 1873, vol.1, p.33.

  28 mother and brothers’ careers: AH, Meine Bekenntnisse, 1769–1805, Biermann 1987, pp.50, 53; Holl 2009, p.30; Beck 1959–1961, vol.1, p.11ff.; WH to CH, 15 January 1790, WH CH Letters 1910–16, vol.1, p.74.

 
; 29 AH in Frankfurt an der Oder: AH to Ephraim Beer, November 1787, AH Letters 1973, p.4; Beck 1959–61, vol.1, p.14.

  30 AH in Göttingen: Holl 2009, p.23ff.; Beck 1959–61, vol.1, pp.18–21.

  31 ‘Our characters are too’: WH, Geier 2009, p.63.

  32 AH dreamed of adventures: AH, Mein Aufbruch nach America, Biermann 1987, p.64.

  33 visited botanical garden: AH Cosmos 1845–52, vol.2, p.92; AH, Meine Bekenntnisse, 1769–1805, Biermann 1987, p.51.

  34 Forster’s influence: AH, Ich Über Mich Selbst, 1769–90, Biermann 1987, p.36ff.

  35 15,000 ships to London: White 2012, p.168; see also Carl Philip Moritz, June 1782, Moritz 1965, p.26.

  36 a ‘black forest’: Richard Rush, 7 January 1818, Rush 1833, p.79.

  37 AH in London: AH to Wilhelm Gabriel Wegener, 20 June 1790; AH to Paul Usteri, 27 June 1790, AH to Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi, 3 January 1791, AH Letters 1973, pp. 93, 96, 117; AH, Ich Über Mich Selbst, 1769–90, Biermann 1987, p.39.

  38 AH crying in London: AH, Ich Über Mich Selbst, 1769–90, Biermann 1987, p.38.

  39 ‘There is a drive’: AH to Wilhelm Gabriel Wegener, 23 September 1790, AH Letters 1973, pp.106–7.

  40 notice for sailors, Hampstead: AH, Ich Über Mich Selbst, 1769–90, Biermann 1987, p.38.

  41 ‘too good a son’: AH, Meine Bekenntnisse, 1769–1805, Biermann 1987, p.51; see also AH to Joachim Heinrich Campe, 17 March 1790, AH Letters 1973, p.88.

  42 ‘mad letters’: AH, Ich Über Mich Selbst, 1769–90, Biermann 1987, p.40.

  43 ‘My unhappy circumstances’: AH to Paul Usteri, 27 June 1790, AH Letters 1973, p.96.

  44 ‘perpetual drive’: AH to David Friedländer, 11 April 1799, AH Letters 1973, p.658.

  45 ‘brain has been’: Georg Forster to Heyne, Bruhns 1873, vol.1, p.31.

  46 going to ‘snap’: CH to WH, 21 January 1791, WH CH Letters 1910–16, vol.1, p.372; CH and AH had first met in December 1789.

  47 ‘race-horse speed’: Alexander Dallas Bache, 2 June 1859, ‘Tribute to the Memory of Humboldt’, Pulpit and Rostrum, 15 June 1859, p.133; see also WH to CH, 2 April 1790, WH CH Letters 1910–16, vol.1, p.116.

  48 all numbers and account books: AH to William Gabriel Wegener, 23 September 1790, AH Letters 1973, p.106.

  49 travel and botany books: AH to Samuel Thomas Sömmerring, 28 January 1791, AH Letters 1973, p.122.

  50 ‘sight of the ships’: AH to William Gabriel Wegener, 23 September 1790, AH Letters 1973, p.106.

  51 ‘master of his own’: AH to William Gabriel Wegener, 27 March 1789, AH Letters 1973, p.47.

  52 mining academy Freiberg: AH, Meine Bekenntnisse, 1769–1805, Biermann 1987, p.54.

  53 AH completes programme in 8 months: AH to Archibald MacLean, 14 October 1791, AH Letters 1973, p.153.

  54 AH daily life in Freiberg: AH to Dietrich Ludwig Gustav Karsten, 25 August 1791; AH to Paul Usteri, 22 September 1791; AH to Archibald MacLean, 14 October 1791, AH Letters 1973, pp.144, 151–2, 153–4.

  55 wedding and Thuringia trip: AH to Dietrich Ludwig Gustav Karsten, ibid., p.146.

  56 CH to WH, 14 January 1790 and 21 January 1791, CH Letters 1910–16, vol.1, pp.65, 372.

  57 AH spent every hour with friend: AH to Archibald MacLean, 14 October 1791, AH Letters 1973, p.154.

  58 ‘I have never loved’: AH to Carl Freiesleben, 2 March 1792, ibid., p.173.

  59 AH berated himself: AH to Archibald MacLean, 6 November 1791, ibid., p.157.

  60 AH half embarrassed by success: AH to Freiesleben, 7 March 1792, ibid., p.175.

  61 rarely opened his heart: AH to William Gabriel Wegener, 27 March 1789, ibid., p.47.

  62 AH thinking of old friends: AH to Archibald Maclean, 1 October 1792, 9 February 1793, Jahn and Lange 1973, pp.216, 233; see also AH’s letter to Carl Freiesleben during this time, for example 14 January 1793, 19 July 1793, 21 October 1793, 2 December 1793, 20 January 1794, AH Letters 1973, pp.227–9, 257–8, 279–81, 291–2, 310–15.

  63 ‘damned, always lonely’: AH to Archibald Maclean, 9 February 1793; see also 6 November 1791, AH Letters 1973, pp.157, 233.

  64 in squalid taverns: AH to Carl Freiesleben, 21 October 1793, ibid., p.279.

  65 two years of his life: AH to Carl Freiesleben, 10 April 1792, ibid., p.180.

  66 ‘sweetest hours’: AH to Carl Freiesleben, 6 July 1792, ibid., p.201; see also 21 October 1793 and 20 January 1794, ibid., pp.279, 313.

  67 ‘foolish letters’: AH to Carl Freiesleben, 13 August 1793, ibid., p.269.

  68 AH inventions: AH, Über die unterirdischen Gasarten und die Mittle, ihren Nachteul zu vermindern. Ein Beytrag zur Physik der praktischen Bergbaukunde, Braunschweig: Vieweg, 1799, Plate III; AH to Carl Freiesleben, 20 January 1794, 5 October 1796, AH Letters 1973, pp.311ff., 531ff.

  69 textbooks for miners: AH to Carl Freiesleben, 20 January 1794, AH Letters 1973, p.311.

  70 sixteenth-century mining manuscripts:, Ibid., p.310ff.

  71 ‘8 legs and 4 arms’: AH to Carl Freiesleben, 19 July 1793, ibid., p.257.

  72 AH often ill: AH to Carl Freiesleben, 9 April 1793 and 20 January 1794; AH to Friedrich Wilhelm von Reden, 17 January 1794; AH to Dietrich Ludwig Karsten, 15 July 1795, ibid., pp.243–4, 308, 311, 446.

  73 book on basalts: AH, Mineralogische Beobachtungen über einige Basalte am Rhein, 1790.

  74 book on subterraneous flora: AH, Florae Fribergensis specimen, 1793; inspired by the work of the French chemist Antoine Laurent Lavoisier and the British scientist Joseph Priestley, Humboldt also began to examine the stimulus of light and hydrogen on the production of oxygen in plants; AH, Aphorismen aus der chemischen Physiologie der Pflanzen, 1794.

  75 AH experimented on himself: AH to Johann Friedrich Blumenbach, 17 November 1793, AH Letters 1973, p.471; AH 1797, vol.1, p.3.

  76 ‘street urchin’: AH to Johann Friedrich Blumenbach, June 1795, Bruhns 1873, vol.1, p.150; the original German is ‘Gassenläufer’, Bruhns 1872, vol.1, p.173.

  77 all went ‘splendidly’: AH to Johann Friedrich Blumenbach, 17 November 1793, AH Letters 1973, p.471.

  78 Über den Bildungstrieb: The first edition was published in 1781, and the second in February 1789. Humboldt arrived in Göttingen in April 1789; for Blumenbach, see Reill 2003, p.33ff.; Richards 2002, p.216ff.

  79 ‘Gordian knot’: AH to Freiesleben, 9 February 1796, AH Letters 1973, p.495.

  Chapter 2: Imagination and Nature

  1 Humboldt in Jena: AH first went to Jena in July 1792 and stayed together with his brother Wilhelm at Friedrich Schiller’s house but he only met Goethe briefly in March 1794, and then again in December 1794; AH to Carl Freiesleben, 6 July 1792, AH Letters 1973, p.202; Goethe’s Day 1982–96, vol.3, p.303.

  2 progressive Jena: Merseburger 2009, p.113; Safranski 2011, p.70.

  3 liberty in Jena: Schiller to Christian Gottlob Voigt, 6 April 1795, Schiller Letters 1943–2003, vol.27, p.173.

  4 Weimar description: Merseburger 2009, p.72.

  5 brightest minds in Jena and Weimar: de Staël 1815, vol.1, p.116.

  6 WH and Schiller at market square: Wilhelm lived at Unterm Markt 4 and Schiller lived at Unterm Markt 1, AH Letters 1973, p.386.

  7 WH invited Goethe: WH to Goethe, 14 December 1794, Goethe Letters 1980–2000, vol.1, p.350.

  8 noisy discussions: Maria Körner, 1796, Goethe Encounters 1965–2000, vol.4, p.222; for daily meetings see Goethe’s diaries during this time.

  9 He ‘forced us’: Goethe, 17–19 December 1794, Goethe Encounters 1965–2000, vol.4, p.116.

  10 ‘In eight days’: Goethe to Karl August, Duke of Saxe-Weimar, March 1797, ibid., p.288.

  11 AH visit December 1794: Goethe, December 1794, Goethe’s Year 1994, pp.31–2; December 1794, Goethe Encounters 1965–2000, vol.4, pp.116–17, 122; Goethe to Max Jacobi, 2 February 1795, Goethe Correspondence 1968–76, vol.2, pp.194, 557; AH to Reinhard von Haeften, 19 December 1794, AH Letters 1973, p.388.

  12 frozen Rhine: Boyle 2000, p.256.

  13 walki
ng to anatomy lectures: Goethe, December 1794, Goethe’s Year 1994, p.32.

  14 Goethe and stove: Goethe to Schiller, 27 February 1797, Goethe Correspondence 1968–76, vol.2, p.257.

  15 AH stimulated Goethe: Goethe, December 1794, Goethe Encounters 1965–2000, vol.4, p.122.

  16 Karl August in Werther uniform: Merseburger 2009, p.67.

  17 Werther fever: Friedenthal 2003, p.137.

  18 Goethe’s early years in Weimar: Merseburger 2009, pp.68–9; Boyle 1992, p.202ff., 243ff.

  19 Christiane Vulpius: Goethe eventually married Christiane Vulpius in 1806.

  20 ‘that of a woman’: Botting 1973, p.38.

  21 ‘fat of his cheeks’: Karl August Böttiger about Goethe, mid-1790s, Goethe’s Day 1982–96, vol.3, p.354.

  22 ‘Apollo’ and changed appearance: Maria Körner to K.G. Weber, August 1796, Goethe Encounters 1965–2000, vol.4, p.223.

  23 Goethe’s son in miner’s uniform: Goethe’s Day 1982–96, vol.3, p.354.

  24 ‘cold, mono-syllabled God’: Jean Paul Friedrich Richter to Christian Otto, 1796, quoted in Klauss 1991, p.14; for Goethe’s arrogance: Friedrich Hölderlin to Christian Ludwig Neuffer, 19 January 1795, Goethe’s Day 1982–96, vol.3, p.356.

  25 Goethe rude: W. von Schak about Goethe, 9 January 1806, Goethe Encounters 1965–2000, vol.6, p.4.

  26 ‘sacred poetic fire’: Henry Crabb Robinson, 1801, Robinson 1869, vol.1, p.86.

  27 ‘No one was more isolated’: Goethe, 1791, quoted in Safranski 2011, p.103.

  28 ‘the great Mother’: Goethe, ibid., p.106.

  29 Goethe’s house and garden: Klauss 1991; Ehrlich 1983; Goethe’s Day 1982–96, vol.3, pp.295–6

  30 ‘was getting tired’: Goethe to Johannn Peter Eckermann, 12 May 1825, Goethe Eckermann 1999, p.158.

  31 ‘most melancholic mood’: Goethe, 1794, Goethe’s Year 1994, p.26.

  32 lived like hermit: Goethe, 1790, ibid., p.19.

  33 ‘plank in a shipwreck’: Goethe, 1793, ibid., p.25.

  34 18,000 specimens: Ehrlich 1983, p.7.

  35 Metamorphosis of Plants: Goethe, Versuch die Metamorphose der Pflanzen zu erklären, 1790.