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Review - Longitude - Dava Sobel

One of the most unlikely yet most successful popular science books, the epic story of clockmaker John Harrison's attempts to come up with a chronometer that would keep time accurately enough at sea to be able to fix the position of the ship. He faced technical, scientific and political challenges along the way.

In many ways this as a classic tale of the obsessed man, fighting all odds to achieve his goal - and though not really warts and all, it doesn't try to portray Harrison in black and white.

Short enough to read in an afternoon, and well worth acquiring. In the end there's not a lot of science in it, but it's a great story and Sobel tells it beautifully and lyrically.

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Reviewed by Brian Clegg

Reader's review:

Dava Sobel’s Longitude is about one man’s quest to find a solution to the problem which confounded the best brains for centuries. Brilliant minds like Galileo attempted and failed. Some of the ideas to solve it ranged from the impractical to the ridiculous. Check out ‘The Cannon solution’ and ‘The powder of Sympathy’. The book has captured the atmosphere of the times and the need to rule the seas.

John Harrison was a genius clockmaker who dedicated his whole life to the pursuit of building the perfect chronometer. His inventions put him directly on collision course with the elite astronomers of the era. Some of them simply could not accept that this ‘mechanic’ had found the answer and were not averse to adopting unfair means to rob his glory. The clash between them makes for a riveting story.

There is a childlike enthusiasm evident throughout the book and especially in the chapters explaining the four clocks of John Harrison. The book becomes a little bit of a drag at the end when various clockmakers and the mass production of clocks are described. But this small criticism aside, it is a delightful book to read.

Reviewed by Pradeep Johnson

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