Historian Andrea Wulf amassed mountains of accolades for The Invention of Nature, her biography of 19th century Prussian naturalist Alexander von Humboldt. (The New York Times calls it “readable, thoughtful and widely researched,” while the LA Times awarded it the Science & Technology Book of the Year.) Though he’s largely unknown today, Humboldt was a founding father of environmental science, one of the most famous (and well-traveled) men in the world during his time. Not too many other people have a species of penguin named after them, let alone an ocean current and a county in California.
Andrea Wulf
