For an ABC Radio National interview with Simon Winchester, click here.
This is the fantastic story of Joseph Needham, the eccentric scientist who unlocked the mysteries of the Middle Kingdom. This married Englishman, a freethinking intellectual, while working at Cambridge University in 1937, fell in love with a visiting Chinese student, with whom he began a lifelong affair. He became fascinated with China, and embarked on a series of extraordinary expeditions to the farthest frontiers of this ancient empire. He searched everywhere for evidence to bolster his conviction that the Chinese were responsible for hundreds of mankind's most familiar innovations -- including printing, the compass, explosives, suspension bridges, even toilet paper -- often centuries before the rest of the world. His dangerous journeys took him across war-torn China to far-flung outposts, consolidating his deep admiration for the Chinese people.
After the war, Needham began writing what became a seventeen-volume encyclopedia, "Science and Civilisation in China", which was hailed as a masterpiece of scholarship, fundamentally reshaping the global story of scientific progress. His work has given rise to the 'Needham Question', namely why China lost its lead.
Seven of these seventeen volume are available on www.archive.org - see Vol. 2 / Vol. 3 / Vol. 4 / Vol. 5 / Vol. 6 / Vol. 7 - however, I doubt you'd be up to reading even those few volumes, so dive straight into Simon Winchester's latest masterpiece, "The Man Who Loved China".
This truly amazing story tells you how much else - apart from COVID - the West owes to China!
P.S. For "The Life of Joseph Needham", click here.
P.P.S. Once you're hooked on Simon Winchester's beautifully researched writing, you may also want to read some of his other books, many of which you can "test-drive" here:
- "The Map That Changed The World"
- "The River at the Centre of the World"
- "Atlantic"
- "Pacific Rising"
- "The Sun Never Sets : travels to the remaining outposts of the British Empire"
- "Krakatoa : the day the world exploded"
- "The Professor And The Madman : a tale of murder, insanity, and the making of the Oxford English dictionary"
- "A Crack In The Edge Of The World : the great American earthquake of 1906"
- "The Men Who United The States : America's explorers, inventors, eccentrics, and mavericks, and the creation of one nation, indivisible"
- "Their Noble Lordships : Class and power in modern Britain"
- "The Fracture Zone : a return to the Balkans"
- "Korea : a walk through the land of miracles some of his other books, many of which you can "test-drive"
