"It is like confessing a murder," Charles Darwin admitted as he wrote "On the Origin of Species," recognizing that his theory of evolution would be viewed as revolutionary and even heretical. The letter in which he revealed his hesitations about publishing is on display in the American Museum of Natural History's "Darwin" exhibit, the most complete collection of specimens, artifacts, original manuscripts and Darwin-related memorabilia ever assembled.
The exhibition reveals, in all its messy detail, Darwin's own reluctant evolution from a student who was at best mediocre to a young botanist who doubted his own abilities and finally to the most revered — and divisive — scientist of his time.
Those who see Darwin as anti-religion are in for a surprise, as are those who see him only as a stern white-bearded man glowering out of a biology textbook. They will discover a Darwin who faced up to his own professional struggles and was protective of his private life, preferring his quiet suburban home with his wife and ten children to the celebrity and controversy that enveloped him after he made his theory public.
Not surprisingly, the exhibition shows Darwin in action as a scientist and explorer. Greeting visitors at the entrance are two live Galapagos tortoises, fifty pounds each, just like the ones Darwin would have seen during his stint as the naturalist aboard the South America-bound HMS Beagle, when he got his first inkling that species adapted over time through natural selection. Not to be missed is an unpublished account in one of Darwin's leather-bound notebooks of the rides he took on tortoises' backs.
Darwin's primary tool — a magnifying glass — is one of the early highlights of the exhibition, positioned just inside the door and amplifying the iridescent wings of a dragonfly.
Further inside, many of his original notes are on display, with translations of the messy cursive scrawl typed out next to them. Aside from tales of sampling his specimens both on purpose (iguana tasted better than armadillo, he determined) and by accident (he put a beetle in his mouth for safekeeping and was dismayed to find that it released an acrid secretion onto his tongue), they reveal how his theory of evolution took shape.
Pages of notes with detailed observations about finches, iguanas, horned frogs and the other animals of the Galapagos show Darwin's slightly hesitant, gradual recognition of the magnitude of his idea. On one page, a rough but instantly recognizable drawing of the evolutionary tree is topped with a caption, in emphatic lettering, that epitomizes Darwin's reluctance to acknowledge his own findings: "I think."
Details of Darwin's personal life are also on display. A centerpiece of the exhibition is a recreation of Darwin's study, which gives a sense of the domestic life he cherished and of why, after drawing that evolutionary tree, he waited 21 years to publish it and shock the world.
His walking stick, carved to resemble the stem of a twining plant, leans against a wooden desk next to the fire. The nearly empty brandy decanters on the hearth and the bed for his dog Polly on the worn rug figure just as prominently as the specimens, stacks of books and one of only 28 surviving pages of "On the Origin of Species." The study was Darwin's favorite room in the house where he spent the last 40 years of his life.
Nearby, visitors can read the analytical text that Darwin penned while he sat on his notes on evolution — a list of the pros and cons of getting married. The pros include "constant companion ... better than a dog." Finally the allure of "a nice wife on a sofa" won out over "the conversation of clever men in clubs," and Darwin married his first cousin, Emma Wedgwood.
"I think you will humanize me, and soon teach me there is greater happiness, than building theories & accumulating facts in silence & solitude," he wrote to his fiancée in one of several love letters on display.
If Emma was one of the great loves of Darwin's life, beetles were the others. In addition to some specimens of the 1,500 species that he acquired on the Beagle voyage — including Venus flytraps and horned frogs — the exhibition includes several of the beetles he collected from childhood. Personal letters are on display in which his father, Robert Waring Darwin, expresses his disdain for Charles' propensity for collecting rather than studying.
Robert was desperate for his son to enter a respectable profession and differentiate himself from his grandfather. Erasmus Darwin had been widely known as a crackpot for publishing his own theory of evolution, without much evidence to support it, decades before Charles was born. (In fact, "Darwinizing" had become a popular synonym for "wildly speculating.")
So Robert sent his son to Cambridge to enter the clergy.
By the time he set out on his life-changing Beagle voyage at age 22, Darwin was still planning to enter the church. The exhibition makes this clear with a display of the objects he brought on board with him. Right in the center of the tools one would expect to see — geological instruments for measuring elevations, a compass, pistols and a rifle — is Darwin's gold-edged Bible.
The tension between religion and his work in science that Darwin was acutely aware of — it was one of the reasons he held off publishing for so long, and one of the only sources of strife in his otherwise happy marriage — is the subject of the last section of the exhibition, called "Social Reactions to Darwin." "The Origin of Species," the display says, sold out of bookstores the first day it was put on shelves. The book provoked strong reactions, inspiring political speeches and sermons all over Europe and America.
Sound familiar?
The present controversy over intelligent design is evidence that the evolution debate still rages in some circles. But the "Darwin" exhibition is, not surprisingly, unequivocal.
Museum of Natural History President Ellen V. Futter cites the desire to clear up "public confusion about major scientific issues, including the origins and diversity of life on Earth" as one of the primary reasons for mounting the exhibition. And without ever mentioning the phrase "intelligent design," the exhibition presents modern support and applications for evolution, placing it on par with gravity as an extremely well-substantiated theory.
A display that includes videotaped interviews with many of the leading scientists of today explains that a "theory" in the scientific sense doesn't mean a hunch or a nonscientific explanation for the origins of life, but rather a testable hypothesis that is supported by extensive evidence. Other videos and interactive stations illustrate the position of Darwin's theory at the core of all biology and its applications in fighting diseases such as SARS and AIDS.
"Darwin's theory is strengthened and confirmed over and over again," says the scientist's great-great grandson, Randal Keynes, in a voiceover to an eight-minute biopic shown at the exhibit.
Controversy aside, the last room in the exhibit suggests that Darwin was not without a sense of wonder or poetry. On the way out, visitors walk through a room in which orchids — the flowers that Darwin called perfect examples of evolution and which he collected in empty jars and biscuit tins for dissection — are suspended from the ceiling.
Amid the exquisite purple and red and white blossoms, the last line of Darwin's "On the Origin of Species" is written on the wall. "From so simple a beginning," it reads, "endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved."
"Darwin" is on view at the American Museum of Natural History, Central Park West and 79th Street, through May 26. Timed tickets to the exhibition, which include Museum admission, are $21 for adults, $16 for students and seniors and $12 for children. Tickets can be reserved in advance by calling 212-769-5200 or visiting www.amnh.org. Museum hours: daily, 10 a.m. to 5:45 p.m. There are also lectures and panel discussions. Information: 212-769-5100 or www.amnh.org. "Darwin" is on exhibition in collaboration with the Museum of Science, Boston; the Field Museum, Chicago; the Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto, Canada; and the Natural History Museum, London, England.
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