George Gaylord SimpsonThe Dechronization of Sam MagruderIntroduction by Arthur C. ClarkeAfterword by Stephen Jay GouldMonika says:
Everybody interested in paleontology probably dreams about travelling to an early epoch of earth history. E. g. to the early Tertiary period when Europe was still in the Tropics and todays Messel pit was a lake slowly drying up. Or maybe go back ever further to the era of the dinosaurs. Fascinating idea, isn't it? So many questions ardently discussed today among the experts could be settled once and for all - provided there would be a way to travel in time. In the 22nd Century scientist Sam Magruder found a way, but a very uncertain one. Neither can he predict where his travels will take him nor can he ever come back. Once he made the jump in time he would be stranded for the rest of his life. Nevertheless he can't resist the temptation and embarks on this journey. He arrives in the late Cretaceous period, about 80 million years before our time, surrounded by dinosaurs. Geologists of his own time dig up his notes, chiseled in rock. George Gaylord Sompson who died in 1984 earned worldwide recognition as a paleontologist. The manuscript of THE DECHRONIZATION OF SAM MAGRUDER was discovered among his estate by his daughter Joan Simpson Burns. Why he never deemed this treasure worthy of publication we do not know. In order to understand the novel one has to pay attention to the introduction as well as the epilog. There Simpson's descriptions of dinosaurs are put into the scientific context of the time the novel was written. In his epilog Stephen Jay Gould calls the reader's attention to the fact that Sam Magruder is Simpsons alter ego. Simpson was a very conservative paleontologist. He never agreed with his colleagues John Ostrom and Robert Bakker who initiated the so-called "Dinosaur Rennaissance" in the late 60ies and early 70ies when they described dinosaurs as warm-blooded agile animals. So Sam Magruder encounters slow cold-blooded reptiles in accordance with received opinion for a long time. Nevertheless the book is worth reading, written in a brilliant style and language. George Gaylord Simpson: The Dechronization
of Sam Magruder |
|||
Copyright 1998 Christina Gross & Monika Hübner |
