This Thing of Darkness
By (Author) Harry Thompson
Headline Publishing Group
Headline Review
15th August 2005
United Kingdom
General
Fiction
823.92
640
Width 159mm, Height 51mm, Spine 242mm
1063g
This is an epic novel of sea-faring adventure set in the 19th century charting the life of Robert Fitzroy, the captain of ,The Beagle, and his passenger Charles Darwin. It combines adventrure, emotion, ideas, humour and tragedy as well as illuminating the history of the 19th century. Fitzroy, the Christian Tory aristocrat, believed in the sanctity of the individual, but his beliefs destroyed his career and he committed suicide. Darwin, the liberal minor cleric doubts the truth of the Bible and develops his theory of evolution which is brutal and unforgiving in human terms. The two friends became bitter enemies as Darwin destroyed everything Fitzroy stood for.
Harry Thompson was a highly successful television producer 'Have I Got News for You, They Think It's All Over, Never Mind the Buzzcocks' and the author of a number of non-fiction bestsellers 'Peter Cook, The Biography'. He wrote for most of the national newspapers, especially on travel, and was nominated for Travel Journalist of the Year. He died in November 2005.