John van Wyhe*
-Author Affiliations
Christ's College Cambridge CB2 3BU, UK
(jmv21@cam.ac.uk)
Image not related to this article/Imagem não relacionada a este artigo: Ninjadoodle
Abstract
It is widely believed that Charles Darwin avoided publishing his theory of evolution for many years. Many explanations have been proposed to identify Darwin's reasons or motives for doing so. This essay demonstrates that Darwin's delay is a recent historiographical theme for which there is no clear evidence, and indeed is overwhelmingly contradicted by the historical evidence. It is also shown that Darwin's belief in evolution was not a secret before publication. Instead of a man afraid of his secret theory's being revealed to his prejudiced contemporaries, it is demonstrated that Darwin was understandably very busy and began his species book when he had completed work in hand, just as he had intended all along. This essay therefore rewrites a fundamental chapter in the story of Darwin's life and work as usually told.
Keywords: Charles Darwin evolution ‘Darwin's delay’ historiography
Footnotes
Footnotes
© 2007 The Royal Society
+++++
