A Book in Review: Angels and Ages

Angels and Ages: A Short Book About Darwin, Lincoln, and Modern Life By: Adam Gopnik
Non-Fiction: History, biography, science
Book Count: 0 (audio book)

I listened to this book on CD on a reasont trip I took. This book is on the life of Lincoln and Darwin, who were both born on the same day 200 years ago. The author feels that they both have a lot in common in the way that they shaped modern life. He divides his chapters into one on one and the next on the other giving biographical information and then analyst on what this means, how it was scene at that time and how this changed life. The parts that were only going over the life of each person were interesting. The other parts were often long, boring, some what confusing in the logic behind it and otherwise not that great. I still don't understand what the two have in common besides their birthday and that they both changed history in distinctly differn ways that change the way we think today. Towards the end the parts on Darwin were rather offencive, even if you believe in evolution, unless you are an atheist. Basically, from what I could tell, the author thinks that no one no matter what their religion is should have a problem with evolution because religion should be some things that you do that makes you feel good, or is fun like Santa giving gifts at Christmas, and shouldn't affect your daily life in any way as it shouldn't change your beliefs or morals. Any way, even with out that the book doesn't offer anything new and interesting besides the parts on the title, mainly the question that on the death of Lincoln was it said that, "Now he belongs to the Ages." or "Now he belongs to the Angels." As each has a distince meaning connecting to peoples beliefs at that time.