City Travel Guides
Home Page > Go back a page
Books : His Invention So Fertile: A Life of Christopher Wren
Search Books - select a category
See Larger Image |
His Invention So Fertile: A Life of Christopher Wren by: Adrian Tinniswood List Price: £12.50 City Travel Guides Price: £11.19 You Save: £1.31 (10%)Prices subject to change. |
|
Availability: Usually dispatched within 24 hours
Binding: Paperback Dewey Decimal Number: 720.92 EAN: 9780712673648 ISBN: 0712673644 Label: Pimlico Manufacturer: Pimlico Number Of Pages: 480 Publication Date: May 02, 2002 Publisher: Pimlico Studio: Pimlico Sales Rank: 259948 Related Items:
Related Items:     see moreBrowse for similar items by category:
Editorial Review: Amazon.co.uk Review: In his biography His Invention So Fertile: A Life of Christopher Wren Adrian Tinniswood offers a sweeping account of Sir Christopher Wren, allegedly the greatest architect England ever produced. Wren's long life spanned the English and Scientific Revolutions, the Restoration of the monarchy in 1688, the Great Fire of London and the creation of the most enduring of all London monuments, St Paul's Cathedral. As Tinniswood points out, Wren was a key player in all these events, "a man who made ground-breaking discoveries in optics, astronomy, anatomy, mathematics; a man who combined his scientific interests with an architectural career spanning six reigns and nearly six decades; the arbiter of architectural taste to generations of designers and courtiers". Tinniswood tries to put the man back into the genius, despite conceding that "we need to appreciate that Wren's work was his life". The domestic details of Wren's complex private life are carefully detailed, but Tinniswood often seems overawed by his hero, especially when trying to come to grips with the finer points of Wren's mathematical achievements and his extraordinary architectural output, which require a more scholarly grasp than Tinniswood is able to provide. Concluding that no one "has ever possessed as much vision as Christopher Wren", some may feel that Tinniswood himself has identified, but ultimately failed to capture the precise nature of this remarkable vision. --Jerry Brotton Frances Spalding, Independent: ‘This lively, sympathetic and hugely informative biography brings us closer to Wren than ever before.' Synopsis: This portrait of Christopher Wren (1632-1723), the great British architect, aims to show us the man behind the legend. Wren was a founder of the Royal Society, he mapped the moon and the stars, investigated the problem of longitude and the rings of Saturn, and carried out groundbreaking experiments into the circulation of the blood. His observations on comets, meteorology and muscular action made vital contributions to the developing ideas of Newton, Halley and Boyle. This book presents a complete picture of this genius: the Surveyor of the King's Works, running the nation's biggest architectural office and wrestling with corruption and interference; the pioneering anatomist; the mathematician, devising new navigational instruments and lecturing on planetary motion. But this biography also shows us the man behind the legend: Wren was married and widowed twice; he fathered a mentally handicapped child; he quarrelled with his colleagues and fell foul of his employers; he scrambled over building sites and went to the theatre and drank in coffee-houses.This book explores what it was like to be at Oxford during the Commonwealth, as a generation struggled to make sense of a society in chaos; it recreates the tensions which tore apart the court of Charles II; and it sets out to bring to life the petty jealousies that formed an integral part of both the building world and the scientific milieu of the Royal Society. From the Publisher: Praise for 'His Invention So Fertile': 'The most engaging non-fiction I've come across recently.' Jeremy Paxman, 'Observer' 'Lively, knowledgeable, affectionate ... [a] fine biography.' Jenny Uglow, 'Sunday Times' 'Powered by an engrossing passion for its subject ... the scale and scope of [Wren's] achievements are left standing clearer than ever.' Andrew Motion, 'Financial Times' 'More than most of the galaxy of historians who have ... charted the life and work of our greatest ever architectural exponent, Adrian Tinniswood attempts to extract the man from his buildings. He gives us the serious, consumptive Westminster schoolboy poring over his Euclid and Latin grammar; he re-creates 17th-century Oxford ('a perfect Sodom and Gomorrah') where the 'pathologically earnest' young student first discovered the astronomics of Ptolemy and Copernicus; he shows us Wren the caring husband (twice – both wives pre-deceased him), and, most poignantly, Wren the fretting father of a mentally handicapped child.' Peter J. M. Wayne, 'Spectator' 'Thorough, informative, clear.' Rowan Moore, 'Evening Standard' 'A fine, well-balanced biography.' Michael Prodger, 'Sunday Telegraph' 'Fascinating.' David Bradbury, 'Daily Mail' About the Author: Adrian Tinniswood was born in 1954. For many years he acted as consultant to the National Trust on educational matters. He has lectured extensively in Britain and America on English social and architectural history. Customer Reviews
Average Rating:
 Rating:  - Extremely readable account of England's greatest architectTinniswood's new book is the first of a string of new biographies of Wren due out over the next few years. Tinniswood is a writer first and a historian second and he was succeeded in producing a book that is undoubtedly highly readable. The tone is, as a colleague described, positively conspiratorial and the reader is seduced into turning each of the 463 pages to find out what happens next. This is thoroughly admirable in a history book and there is no doubt that Tinniswood has succeeded in his aim of producing the most readable account of Wren's life to date. He is also extremely good at setting the scene, quoting from a wide range of sources from the period, rumour as well as fact. In view of all this it seems mean to find fault, but as ... Read More: Rating:  - Discover and delight in Wren MasterpieceA knowledgeable biography with an all encompasing understanding of the architectual genius of the man - the best known of the British elite creators - but still appreciating the scope and range of Wren's search for knowledge. An affectionate tale exploring, if not begging desperately for some essence of the man, who despite his interest in anatomy and the physical seems to materially exist soley through his work. Human and enjoyable read. A difficult act to follow. |
|