Though I, regrettably, was unable to be at Professor Browne’s lecture, I did manage to read one of her articles on Darwin. As the title of this post suggests, the article that I read and will discuss here is Charles Darwin as a Celebrity, published in the Science in Context journal in 2003 (Click on the title to see the article).

My reaction to this article is generally positive. It should be noted that there is an underwhelming focus on how Darwin’s public image materially impacted the content and reception of his work, but the article is nonetheless a solid starting ground for those looking to explore that same proposition in more detail.

But I’m not writing this to critique the article. I’m writing to reflect on one of the article’s most important–and paradoxical, perhaps–arguments. Essentially, a great deal of time is spent describing how Darwin was an ostensibly private man–he gave limited interviews with the press, he didn’t expose himself to gawkers, et cetera, et cetera. That makes it all the more impactful when Browne mentions that one of the great rhetorical selling points, so to speak, of The Origin of Species is its personal, nearly autobiographical undertones that made Darwin a seemingly more approachable and relatable author. As Browne herself says of this point, it “is not trivial.” It can be inferred that this “not trivial” point posits both a juxtaposition and ground for public-verses-private comparison.

I think that the logical implication of this argument is that, by suspending his propensity for privacy and instead pouring himself onto the page, Darwin made a controversial book less inflammatory and more approachable. Browne outright states this, but there is considerable tension between that point and Darwin’s aforementioned penchant for secrecy. The way I see it, though, this argumentative dichotomy can be resolved by taking the People Magazine approach.

Let me explain.

Something that the article doesn’t do (at least explicitly) is use modern tabloids and whatnot to contextualize what Darwin’s approach to his fame had been. Though I’m aware of the presentist implications of such a methodology (after all, I railed against presentism in a previous blog post), I think that it’s important given how many other elements of present-day sociological analysis appear in the article. Today, anyone in the checkout line at Hannaford or Walmart or even a gas station has the opportunity to flip through a magazine. That the magazines we have today claim to “expose celebrities’ biggest secrets” and a whole host of other things should not be a surprise to anyone. However, it’s commonplace for celebrities (or it was commonplace prior to Twitter, but bear with me here) to only relate to the public via magazines. Though they may be snoopers, liars, and shameless paparazzi, magazines are a vessel for public-private relations with celebrities. Almost like a PR firm that no one hired.

My question is this: What if we take this assumption made about People Magazine and extrapolate it to also be about The Origin of Species? It would make sense. Darwin had a good number of autobiographical subtexts (or so says Professor Browne) in his landmark book, but not a whole lot of public appearances. Could we be able to explain this away by saying that The Origin of Species was Darwin’s “public appearance?” It would certainly help bridge the logical leap between Darwin’s purported secrecy and the openness of his book. If Professor Browne winds up following this article up, then I certainly hope that she answers this question.