Personal Narrative of a Journey to the Equinoctial Regions of the New Continent: Abridged Edition

by Alexander von Humboldt and Aimé Bonpland

Book Overview

One of the greatest nineteenth-century scientist-explorers, Alexander von Humboldt traversed the tropical Spanish Americas between 1799 and 1804. By the time of his death in 1859, he had won international fame for his scientific discoveries, his observations of Native American peoples and his detailed descriptions of the flora and fauna of the 'new continent'. The first to draw and speculate on Aztec art, to observe reverse polarity in magnetism and...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0140445536
• ISBN13: 9780140445534
• Release Date: May 1996
• Publisher: Penguin Group
• Length: 400 Pages
• Weight: 0.75 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 5.1" x 7.9"
• Age Range: 18 years and up
• Grade Range: Postsecondary and higher

Customer Reviews

My Opinion Thusly

I have to admit that just as I was starting to savour this thin slip of a book I found that it was, indeed, mere selections. The whole narrative is actually three volumes, over four hundred pages a volume. I was left with a craven empty feeling like a fiend for his needle. Humboldt's writing presages Thoreau and through him ponders the transcendent raptures of the natural world. Reading through the visit to the Caribs reminded me of my visits to the Grenadines where their presence is still redolent in the shadows under the almond trees. I felt that I had imbibed the same air as Humboldt.